Panther of the Black Moon
by Eltias
Summary: Year and a half after the Winter War, memories of fights are still haunting all three worlds. Some of these memories have strange ways of returning to existence. Ch. 21: Countdown Towards the Blizzard's Calm
1. Prologue

**A/N : Hi! This is more less my first go at writing up a fanfiction. Apologies in advance with any mistakes with the Bleach-y terms and protocols; I try my best, I promise! That aside, let's get going! :3**

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><p>"Come on, this way!" yelled Renji, trotting away briskly with an impatient wave of his hand at Ichigo, who was still bantering away with the trio of Vizards.<p>

Ichigo whipped his head around to face the source of the sound and yelled back, slightly annoyed, "Hey, wait up! I'm going Bankai on your ass if I get lost in this place because you fled on me!"

Whipping his head back to the Vizards, he snapped at Shinji, "Point still not made, and I gotta go. Hopefully by the time I come back, you can explain to me in plain Japanese, not some philosophical gibberish."

Shinji grinned his characteristic wide grin and drawled, "Yeah, yeah. See ya later, Ichi." and after exchanging short goodbyes with Kensei and Rose, they shunpo-ed away to who knows where. Captains' office, congregating how to torture the guest-to-be?

Ichigo turned around, and started running full-speeds towards Renji's barely visible form. And thoughts started flooding his head...

Damn, Shinji, his stupid grin and even more idiotic philosophy was getting on his nerves already, and he's been in Seireitei for less than half an hour. He was still trying to understand what in the hell inspired the Vizards to join the Shinigamis again; for all he knew, they were worst enemies for the better part of last century or so. But then, it had been almost 18 months since the Winter Wars and from his experience, many, many things could have gone down in a flash in that amount of time.

For example, the last half hour. The grump of Commander General had granted his wish to take back Ginjou's body back to the human world. He had been genuinely surprised by the quick response; he didn't exactly expect bouts of shouting-matches and threats, but neither did he expect the simplicity and quickness of the decision. Not that he was complaining.

And then there was the temporary invite to Seireitei. After Ginjou's burial, he was to come back and get a look around the place and help out with the training sessions for a while. As powerful as the captains, vice-captains and some of the seated officers were, the rest of Shinigamis' skills might as well have been nonexistent compared to them. Or more importantly, to the large numbers of Adjuchas and and Arrancars, which, according to the 12th squad's freaky technology, were still roaming around the Hueco Mundo. The greatest threat of them all had been eliminated by then end of the war, but there were so many, many ways the worlds could screw up again.

Though he hadn't shown it, Ichigo had been elated by the invitation. After about 15 seconds of scowling and pretending to contemplate, he had accepted the offer. Past 18 months, he realized how much he missed his friends in Soul Society. Yes - friends. He knew for a fact that they would stand by him no matter what, accepting the differences between them and helping each other get stronger. He was fond of the bare, brute morals of Seireitei, based on life and death consequences. And he wanted to get to know them more about each of their pasts, goals, and their lives in general. It saddened him somewhat that he would rather spend his time with the shinigami than his family and human friends, but a small voice in the corner of his mind spoke up that he had enough of hiding his true identity and will. He couldn't possibly fit right back into the human world after all he's been through, after he's finally gotten his power back. Smaller part of that voice urged him to just sink into Seireitei for a long, long time, but he was sure to bat it back to silence every time. No more decision, not for now. He still had few more years to be an irresponsible teenager, didn't he?

But responsibility was more of what he would get when he got back to Soul Society. Training the weaker Shinigamis, he would certainly have his hands full. Wait, did he have to do all the paperwork too? He inwardly groans at the thought; he never liked anything to do with a writing utensil and paper. Dammit-

His train of thoughts, along with his run had been cut abruptly when Renji suddenly grabbed the back of Ichigo's shihakusho, bringing him to an awkward, abrupt stop.

"GGGGGGGGAAAAAAAARK, WHAT THE HELL?" Ichigo bellowed as his feet flew out from under him. He landed squarely onto his back, slamming his head onto the hard stone ground, his breath knocked out of his chest. He saw stars. Screw, his back might as well have been broken in half.

Bark of laughter, and then an amused voice stated "Running into a Senkai at a breakneck speed? Could kill ya real quick."

Ichigo stood up onto his shaky feet, rubbing his throbbing head and glaring at Renji, who was not at all trying to conceal his smirk. Still smirking, he continued on, "forgot already that we each need a Hell Butterfly to get through the senkai safely? Not even gonna check on the body you asked for? You're making no sense at all."

"Screw you. Lost in thought is hell lot better than having none like you." Ichigo growled back. He looked around and saw the glowing senkai gate, already open wide. Several Hell Butterflies, fluttering lazily in their small wooden cages. Small group of shinigamis, supporting a white casket. A coffin. Ginjou.

Ichigo felt something quiver inside of him as he thought of the recent, very recent turn of the events. What he felt when his Zangetsu clashed with the Cross of Scaffold was loneliness, hurt, humiliation among many other negative, even desperate emotions. Ginjou had truly hoped that Ichigo would understand him, and when he realized that Ichigo wasn't even close to achieving even a slightest bit of understanding, the life had literally seeped out of him, far before he was physically cut down. Ichigo couldn't help but to feel sorry for the other Substitute Shinigami, and he thought that the least he could do was to give him a proper burial. Along with an apology.

"Yo! Wake up!" Renji yelled, reeling Ichigo in from his thoughts yet again. , "there's your Hell Butterfly, so you can get going now. I'll see ya soon."

Ichigo blinked, rubbed a hand across his face, and gave a small smile at his friend before hardening his face into the usual determined mask.

"Yeah. Soon, Renji."

With that he entered the Senkai gate, followed by his Hell Butterfly and the small group of Shinigamis carrying the coffin. Striding through the bright white light did nothing to calm his turbulence of emotions as he approached the small black opening leading to the other side.

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><p><strong>Thanks for reading, and laters!<strong>


	2. Analysis

**A/N: Hi! So here's Chapter 2.** **Hope you like!**

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><p><em>One week later<em>

Gathering all the relevant paperwork from his desk, Hisagi looked up and grinned at Ichigo, "Congratulations, Kurosaki! Now your official title as one of Seireitei's temporary officer is the Vice-Captain of the Training Division!"

Ichigo had learned when he walked through the senkai gate back into Seireitei that Hisagi Shuuhei, the vice-captain of the 9th division, had been assigned to walk him through all the necessary paperwork and starter protocol trainings. He didn't mind much. As far as he was concerned, Hisagi was cool; he appreciated the honesty, bit of humor, and most of all, tendency to get straight to the point. Most of the time.

Ichigo slumped back into his uncomfortable wooden chair, letting out a sigh of relief and exhaustion. Three hours of questionnaire and trivial analysis. _Three freaking hours_. Full name, physical measurements, battle experience granted, but who gave a damn if his favorite snack was chocolate? Or that he played the guitar? Favorite number - he refused to answer that - or anything else of his personal interest for the matter? His head was going to explode. Along with his bladder.

"Great. Excellent. Fantastic. Now, where's the bathroom in this place?" he blurted out in monotone, not bothering to hide the impatience in his voice.

The black-haired vice-captain let out a huff of laugh, shaking his head, "You've just been given a position of great honor, and all you can think of is going to the bathroom?"

"More like a position of terrifying amount of paperwork. If they'd assigned me as a Captain, _maybe_ then I'd be a bit more excited about it."

"Judging by how much you know about technical combat and the paperwork involved with the job, you're not ready to take position of a captain. Power and brute fighting ability of the moment are not all there is to it."

"I thought I only had to get the referral and approval crap from few of the captains to become one?"

"You have to earn those _crap_, as you call it, Kurosaki. No one in their right mind would refer nor approve of someone who doesn't have the patience to do anything properly."

"Yo! I'm more capable than I seem. Anyhow, all Kenpachi ever does is growl around looking for excuses to start slashing away at people, never anywhere near books and paper. Hold on - lemme backtrack - just slashing away at people, _not_ needing any excuses. How come only he gets to get away with it?" Ichigo grumbled, though only halfheartedly. He knew that Hisagi was right about the fact he was more than lacking in many of the qualities, and even if they overlooked that, he was after all, a substitute shinigami. Whoa, he was dreaming big, even has he thought more of it there and then.

"_Captain Zaraki_ defeated the previous captain of the 11th division in front of the right audience, with proper consequences. Even slightly suggest doing that to anyone to the Commander General, and you're looking for time in prison for treason and stupidity. Or worse, you're headed to the Maggot's Nest." replied Hisagi, quirking up an eyebrow before continuing, "Besides, it's _you_ who couldn't want even half a minute to accept the offer. You like the job, and you're getting paid for the job you like. I suggest you stop with the whining."

It was a little chastisement, but his tone was playful. No serious offense taken, then.

Scowling, Ichigo retorted, "Fine. Let go. Question, though - why did the office need to know about my favorite food, activities, music and stuff? Throwing a welcome party for me sounds too good to be true."

Hisagi grinned sheepishly, "Oh, not a party, sorry to disappoint. I probably should've made it clear that a column about the newest officer amongst us is going up on the next issue of Seireitei Communication! You just contributed to the one-on-one interview section of it for the last hour, that's all."

_"WHAT?" _yelped Ichigo, eyes widening, jumping up from his chair - and falling right back onto it with a resounding crack. Gah, his legs weren't up to the job of supporting him after hours of inactivity. Hopefully his tailbone hadn't shattered from the impact...

Standing up again - successfully this time - he continued, "I don't remember agreeing on giving some useless interview! Yeah, you should've made it clear from the start if it meant getting this thing done an hour earlier."

Hisagi replied, still grinning, "Give it a break, Kurosaki. We needed that interview, and we figured that you wouldn't have contributed by choice. You didn't turn down the questions when I asked them, so technically, you weren't forced."

Ichigo groaned and bit his tongue back. First day on the job, throwing a fit over an issue like that won't do him anything good. Besides, he was tired. He gave a slight kick to the chair he had been sitting on, sending it cluttering a foot away. He turned his attention back to a more immediate concern,

"Bath. Room. Where?"

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><p>After a brief trip to relieve himself, Ichigo was walking after Hisagi along the roads of Seireitei to his assigned quarter at the training barrack near the cliff where Sokyoku used to stand. As he looked up to the cliff, memories started flooding back. The blood, the pain, the truth and the betrayal slamming into him like a cold brick wall... He was glad that the events were more or less behind him; he was sure that he didn't want to go through it all over again, at any given moment.<p>

Giving his head a mental shake to clear off the memories, he asked, "So I'm the vice-captain, cheers. You never told me who the captain is. Do I know him, or is he a new face in the squads?"

Hisagi replied right away, "She, actually. She's been here for only a year, so she would be a new face to you. She's also the 3rd seat of my squad, the 9th." the slightest look of annoyance crossed over his face. He continued, "She's still a raw talent, started off much like you when Kuchiki-san first found you. But it's terrifying, the speed at which she had been developing her Shinigami skillsets."

After letting out a small 'oh' in response, Ichigo fell silent.

He was in no way a sexist, but he wasn't expecting having to work for a woman. Not that he didn't think women weren't up to the job. How could he, after being around terrifying women like Yoruichi-san(_super_woman), Unohana-san(_scary_woman), and Soi Fong(bipolar?). He was pretty sure they could reduce him to an unconscious heap of flesh and bones if they ever bothered.

But then there were those other women shinigamis that got him squirming. There was Rangiku-san, whose favorite pastimes(according to various sources) were _not_ working, drinking and flashing her cleavage around everywhere she went. Yachiru, who chased butterflies around while she wasn't yapping away all her world's thought on Kenpachi's shoulder. That creepy mad scientist Mayuri's vice-captain, who seemed almost as creepy as the captain himself. Then the vice-captain of Aizen's former squad, who shakily fell to pieces by the whole betrayal thing. Were there any stable women shinigami anywhere? But then he couldn't really say that the men were stable either, so all a moot point, he guessed.

Oh, he almost forgot Arisawa, who has been at his side for most of his life. From the few girls he knew, she was the strongest fighter. Or wait, there was Ikumi-san too, who beat up a handful of thugs singlehandedly back when the said bunch of idiots showed up...

Thoughts of his human friends, or the fact that it took him this long to remember them, made him feel somewhat uneasy.

He looked up just in time to see a cluster of white clouds scattering in the otherwise clear, azure sky.

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><p>"Alright, it's here. You'll be staying at the far end of this building. Training grounds are at the back, I'll show you to your office."<p>

The vice-captain gestured to the side of the large building the they were standing in front of and they walked up to it. There were no unusual symbols marking the walls or the front door, which Hisagi explained that it was because the training division was formed quite recently. They walked up to the second story and onto the wide walkway encircling the building, covered by the roof jutting out from the above.

Ichigo looked over the railing of the walkway, and saw a very simple but well-kept garden. Nearest to him, there was an empty, crystal-clear pond. Cluster of rocks of various shapes and sizes lie farther ahead, followed by a crude pavilion. Several young trees here and there provided shades. The whole garden was covered by a layer of soft-looking green grass that made him want to collapse onto it, close his eyes and fall asleep.

Across the garden was a forest of tall, ancient-looking trees and dense, low-lying bushes. Barely visible above the tips of the trees, was the Soukyoku hill, high up and barren in all its empty glory.

Ichigo turned his attention back to the building.

Noticing the lack of activity in the building, Ichigo asked, "Aren't there supposed to be people working here? I can't see anyone."

"Building's quite large in size, and it's only been a month since the training division formed, so there aren't many people working here right now. And the ones who are, are probably off to eat lunch." Hisagi answered, looking around as if to check.

Walking up to a door with a piece of paper that read 'Captain: Training Division' and stopping, Hisagi explained, "Captain's office is right here, yours is little bit up ahead. She is on a short leave for personal training now, but she'll be back quite soon."

"When exactly?" asked Ichigo.

Hisagi opened his mouth to answer, but with a flash of white, the door to the captain's office slid open with a loud crash that couldn't have been any good for the wooden structure. Fraction of a second later, a large black shape shot out of the open door at a breakneck speed, over the railing of the walkway, across the garden and into the forest. Sound of a solid _WHAM_ and a crunchy crash along with a low muffled scream told the two dumbfounded shinigami that the black shape was a man, who unfortunately seemed to have plunged headfirst into a tree and then landed in a thorny bush somewhere.

Wide eyes returning to normal size and closing his open mouth, Hisagi muttered at Ichigo - who was still in a state of slight shock - "Now, I suppose."

With that, he turned his head somewhat dejectedly towards the office and shouted, "It appears that you are making yourself at home already, Kurozachs."

Low, agitated female voice growled in response, "Trying to. _Why_ is an idiot like him in our squad, and _whose_ stupid idea was it to provide his ego an unnecessary boost by giving him a seat, Hisagi?"

"First of all, _vice-captain _Hisagi to you."

"It's a damn mouthful!" the female voice rose in pitch.

"Live with it. And it was probably my idea to give him a seat, and it's his choice to take such pride in his position."

With that, Hisagi strided into the office, gesturing at Ichigo to follow.

Ichigo stepped into the office, eyes immediately focusing on the somewhat petite female shinigami leaning onto the side of the wooden desk in the middle. She looked surprisingly young, younger than him perhaps. Her skin was lightly tanned, dark eyebrows knitted in annoyance(much like himself, he grudgingly noted), dark crimson eyes below glaring. Nose straight, mouth closed in a stubborn line. Her jet-black hair was tied back into a haphazard bun, few strands escaping at the front and hanging over her eyes. She wore standard shinigami uniform with sleeveless shihakusho, toned arms crossed in front of her moderate chest.

She took one look at Ichigo, dark eyes annoyed but intelligent, and gave Hisagi a questioning look.

Returning the look with a slight grin, Hisagi spoke, "But it's the Central 46 and the Gotei 13's unanimous choice to appoint this," he jerked a thumb in Ichigo's direction, "one as your vice-captain. Kurozachs, meet Kurosaki Ichigo, your new vice-captain. Kurosaki, this is Kurozachs Kladias, your new captain."

Hearing Ichigo's name, flash of recognition ran across the woman's visage, annoyed look replaced by one of mild curiosity. Her mouth stretched to a small smirk, and opened to speak - but was cut off by Hisagi,

"Complain, and you'll be the next one out that door, in a similar fashion as the last one. Applies to both of you."

Ichigo was inwardly startled that Hisagi just threatened to throw him and the woman out literally, but he thought that he heard a note of amusement in that, so he supposed that it was an empty threat.

Seeing no harm in playing nice for once, Ichigo started, "Uh, pleased to meet you..." What was he supposed to call her? Captain? By last name? Last name with honorific? First name?

Small smirk stretching into a full-face grin, the woman leaned away from the desk and walked towards Ichigo, stopping few feet in front of him, arms still crossed in front of her. He saw that the top of her head came up to his eyes, but she gave an impression of being taller than him with that sharp, dark, dark red eyes. Ichigo silently swore; what if this one was yet another violent, demanding free spirit?

Voice clear and musing, she answered, "Kladias. That alone would be fine, and nice to meet you too. Kurosaki okay for you?"

To Ichigo's surprise, she uncrossed her arms and offered him a hand. Missing a beat because he wasn't anticipating, he took it, gripping firmly - someone at school said something about firm handshake being a crucial part of a good impression, not only at a job interview but everywhere else.

Kladias's hand gripped back, releasing after a second. If either of their hands were crushed(Ichigo's was, she had a death grip), they didn't show it.

Somewhat relieved that his new boss at least didn't seem like a psychopath, he answered, "Yeah, Kurosaki would be fine, thanks."

With that, the not-a-psychopath captain turned her attention to Hisagi and playfully purred, "So, _vice-captain_ Hisagi, do we qualify to walk out the door on our own two feet or are you still set on tossing us out like a family of stray cats?"

Hisagi raised his eyebrows slightly and answered, "You're both on suspiciously good behavior today, so no." Ghost of a smile playing across his lips, he continued, "So Kurozachs, what's the first impression in the kid?"

Crossing her arms again and then bringing her right hand knuckle to her lips, Kladias stared at Ichigo right into his eyes. Dark reds bore into brown as if to penetrate right through. Something about those eyes irked Ichigo, as if he should recognize them, and he didn't like it. But he stared straight back, determined not to appear intimidated at the least.

After a few tense seconds, the pair of dark reds ended the mini staring contest. Kladias brought her arms to her side, rolled her shoulders back, and threw her head back with a sharp bark of laughter. Grinning ear to ear, showcasing a set of neat, white teeth with sharp canines, she mused, "He seems smart, determined, has plenty of common sense and attitude. For once Seireitei seems to make an acceptable decision."

Relieved once again, Ichigo grinned - though with less teeth - and mused back, "Let's see."

"Excellent! Let's show you to your new office, and go grab a bite. I'm starving."

With that, Kladias briskly strided past the two men and continued onto the direction Hisagi and Ichigo had been heading towards to. Ichigo was few steps into following along when his head was snapped back by Hisagi's shout,

"Hey - Kurozachs! You're going to just leave him in the forest, knocked out cold?"

Without looking back, Kladias let out an overly cheerful "Yup!" and walked on.

It took for a second for Ichigo to catch on to what they were talking about; when he did, he looked at the other vice-captain to spot his eyebrows raised in a mirror image with his own. After a second, Hisagi sighed, closed his eyes and shrugged, which Ichigo interpreted as 'Her problem, not mine.' Then they both caught up to Kladias and fell into strides either side of her.

"So what are you going to do if he bleeds to death in there?" Hisagi inquired.

"His overlarge ego should encase him like a cocoon and shield out all the harm that little forest has to pose. 'Sides, he's not bleeding too bad." Kladias answered nonchalantly.

Curious, Ichigo asked, "What did he do to deserve a one-way ticket to the forest, anyways?"

"Got ridiculously drunk in broad daylight, stumbled into my office uninvited and tried to 'outheat the sunshine' with me," she saw the quizzical look on Ichigo's face and snapped, "his words, not mine. I'm not _that_ terrible of a poet."

She then turned her head towards Hisagi said with stated, "In your language of formality, vice-captain Hisagi, I think it's public display of drunken behavior, trespassing and sexual harassment." Deadpanning, she added, "can I add stupidity?"

A snort and a sigh of exasperation after, Hisagi asked, "Who was it?"

Rubbing a hand to her neck, Kladias answered, looking up as she thought, "Didn't catch much from his drunken jabbers. His name sounded something like 'Umemori' and he was going on and on about '20th', '15' and 'strongest'."

"That sounds like Umesada Toshimori, one of the sixteen 20th-seat officers of our squad. He's been quiet for some time, what the hell got into him?" Hisagi muttered.

Kladias suggested, looking semi-serious, "Unseat the moron, let's see how his ego fares the catastrophe of his life. Tell him that it's me who suggested it, and the next time he storms into my office, drunk or not, I could throw him over to the Sokyoku hill. I swear my aim's gotten better lately."

Ichigo blurted out, part ridiculed, part horrified, "You throw people out the door like that on regular basis?"

Kladias looked to Ichigo and flashed her all-teeth grin again, "If you say so."

Which Ichigo took as a yes.

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><p>After being shown to his office - which consisted of Kladias pointing at a door with a piece of paper that read 'Vice-Captain: Training Division' -, Hisagi took off, saying that he had someone to meet. Kladias had dragged Ichigo down to the mess hall, snagged(secretly, for some reason) a couple Gotei 13 standard-issued lunchbox and ate beside him in an unexpected, complete, thoughtful silence sitting in the shade of a maple tree. Not exactly comfortable, but neither completely unbearable.<p>

So, from Ichigo's point of assessment, his new superior was a woman. Who was shorter than him but could stare him down like nobody else's business. Absolutely laid back, with plenty sense of humor and sarcasm and not much care for honorifics.

She also threw people out the door if they pissed her off. Who knows what else she did.

'Interesting' was an absolute understatement.

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><p><strong>Over 3k words chapter? I must be out of my mind. Anyhow, thoughts? A sentence or two on whether it's terrible, awesome, good, bad, bearable, unbearable, would be appreciated. You're welcome to just choose a word from what I listed, if you'd like :P<strong>


	3. Shift in Alternate Reality

**A/N: Bad news and a good one! Bad news: I've caught a cold, and it gave me annoying sniffles and headaches. Good news: storywriting somehow helps drive the stress off, so there you go, another chapter :)**

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><p>After lunch, Kladias had more or less ordered Ichigo back to the barrack and to his living quarters("Walk. Straight to the far end of the barrack, look for a detached housing with your name on the door."), told him to poke around and get used to the place and left him alone saying that she had work to clear up.<p>

He did exactly that, seeing he didn't have much better of an option. All the people he knew were off to work at the moment, anyways. Besides, he was already somewhat worn out by the morning's happenings. Also, he needed time to try to figure out his new superior.

Walking up to door of the said detached housing, he groaned loudly; there was a note displaying a rather large black cursive '15', a surprisingly well-drawn sketch of a strawberry, and to his utter horror, a blaring bright red kiss-mark. _What the hell?_ No way the last was Kladias's, unless she managed to hide that terrifying feminine side from him completely. Rangiku-san? She was the only one he could think of who would do that...

He hastily ripped the note off, embarrassed that someone might've seen it already.

His living quarters consisted of a quite large living room, off to the left a bedroom with a roomy closet followed by a spacious bathroom with separate tub and shower. There was a small, bare room to the right of the living room that he had no idea what it was for, but he decided determining its use could wait. Overall, he couldn't call it luxurious, but all the necessary furniture were there and they looked like they hadn't been used yet.

Out the living room window he could look down to part of the training grounds, various buildings and walkways crisscrossing all the way to the Gotei 13 barracks. It occurs to him then_, _

_So this really _is _happening, I'm really in Soul Society, in Seireitei, with permission this time, assigned a position and even my own place to stay. Talk about turn of events._

Wariness crashed down on him, leaving him lightheaded and in need of a good nap.

He reached over his shoulder to grab Zangetsu and place it down, only to remember with a jolt that he had left it at the guest housing along with his traveling pack. He cursed out loud; he wasn't up for a walk halfway across Seireitei to get them.

Half a minute into debating whether to fight against the wariness and give into the separation anxiety or to do the other way around, there was a small knock at the door and followed by a "Vice-Captain Kurosaki?"

Hoping that whoever that was didn't see him flinch, Ichigo turned around and saw a man in standard shinigami uniform with crew-cut brown hair standing there - with a small knowing smirk on his face? Screw it, so someone _had_ seen the damn note already_._ Hoping he wasn't blushing, he answered, voice slightly harsher than intended,

"That's me. What'd you want?"

Looking somewhat intimidated by the tone, the shinigami spoke, "Sir! This is Azutora Nakade of the 8th squad, assigned as your temporary assistant until an official one could be chosen. Is there anything you need?"

Ichigo inwardly grinned at himself, previous annoyance vanishing - seems like there actually was a way not to choose between his separation anxiety and nap.

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><p>Ichigo opened his eyes. He blinked twice, not sure if he really had opened his eyes yet or not. Pitch darkness pressed onto him from all sides so he couldn't see a single thing.<p>

A light breeze blew by, ruffling through his hair. He closed his eyes and breathed in, enjoying the coolness the action brought to his entire body - until he remembered that he was in his bedroom, where there wasn't supposed to be any breeze. He opened his eyes again, ready to yell out loud-

Then a voice whispered,

_'Do not worry Ichigo, you are still where you are supposed to be.'_

It took a fraction of a second for Ichigo to recognize whose voice it was,

"Tensa Zangetsu?" he blurted out, incredulous. He wasn't in his bankai form, what was going on?

Loud whisper answered, _'Fool! Lower your voice, we must not be heard!'_

With an almost silent snap of a finger, a tiny pinprick of light appeared about twenty feet in front of him. It waved around for a second and came to a stop, barely lighting up his bankai Zanpakutou spirit's solemn face.

_'It has been a while, Ichigo. As you might have realized, you are in your spirit dimension, still asleep.' _Tensa Zangetsu spoke, his lips barely moving, voice back to the quiet whisper before.

"Yeah... it's been 18 months. Where the hell have you been? Granted, I've been powerless for 17 months, but I've been trying to talk to you ever since I got my shinigami powers back! Almost everyday! An entire month! You fucking blocked me out!" getting angry, his voice started out as a low growl but ended with a full-on shout.

Shock, then annoyance crossed over Tensa Zangetsu's visage. He scoffed,

_'Hmph,'_

Ichigo took a big breath, ready to chew the uncaring spirit out again - only to find that he couldn't. Eyes wide, he choked, both hands flying to his neck. He could breath fine, but his vocal cords didn't seem to want to work.

He turned his eyes to Tensa Zangetsu, demanding an explanation for what just happened. The zanpakutou spirit had a single finger raised to his thin lips, and Ichigo now saw a strange light in his blue-gray eyes.

_'Since you insist on calling for a ruckus, I am sorry that I will have to silence you for the reminder of this conversation.' _the spirit whispered, sincere note of apology in his voice.

Ichigo listened, though vowing for revenge later.

_'I am also sorry that I had not returned your callings this past month. Something I cannot fathom had been happening here for the past year,'_

Sound of glass shattering in the distance. Ichigo's head whipped towards the direction of the sound, but the zanpakutou spirit waved him back,

_'This world has been changing. About a year ago, sky rippled and then something foreign was just... there. It has been haunting here ever since. I have yet to see who, or rather what it is, since it seems to be adept at shielding its appearance. It attacks me from distance from time to time. No, it has no connection with the Fullbring power you had acquired for a short while._

_One thing I am sure of is that that foreign entity is observing this world. Listening. Probing. Taking bites out of the structures, howling every once in a while to hear for echoes. Attacking me lightly, testing my capabilities. It has been sapping away at my strength, which as you should know, is _your_ strength. It has been getting stronger, Ichigo, and as of late, I am not sure if I can make it submit should I ever cross path with it straight on.'_

Ichigo, whose eyes had been widening more and more with each sentence, stared at the zanpakutou spirit in a mix of disbelief and frustration. Another resident in his spirit dimension? As if old man Zangetsu, his hollow self and Tensa Zangetsu three weren't enough. And apparently, this new one was scaring the last one little too much that he had to turn off all the light and speak in ridiculous whispers.

As if speaking up, something far off howled. It wasn't unlike other howls Ichigo had heard before - it might as well been a hippopotamus roaring in one of those free documentaries on television or even a domestic cat screeching at being tossed out of a multi-story building. Except that it had a chilling, resonating quality that rattled the core of his soul. Suddenly, being stuck in the same dimension as it and then being scared of it didn't seem all that stupid.

Was there panic in the zanpakutou spirit's eyes? It certainly was in his voice when he spoke again, louder this time, with even more urgency,

_'It knows you are here, Ichigo. Maybe it has known from the start, I do not know. You need to leave before it does anything!'_

A mouthful of questions rose up to Ichigo's throat, rendered useless by the charm place upon him earlier. Turning away, Tensa Zangetsu disappeared, the tiny pinprick of light next, pitching the world back into oppressive darkness and silence.

* * *

><p>Ichigo's eyes flew open as he jolted the top half of his body up. Vertigo immediately stuck him full on, making him collapse back onto the couch with both hands rubbing his eyes.<p>

'What the...' thousands of thoughts crisscrossed Ichigo's mind as he waited for his vision to clear.

When his eyes returned to, he raised himself up again and saw out the window the horizon soaked in deep scarlet, vibrant colors fading to black of the night sky. _Sunset?_ He thought as he took a glance at the clock on the wall. 9 o'clock, sunset all right. He had been asleep for good 8 hours, yet he was just as tired as he was when he first lied down for a nap.

He turned his eyes to the closed door, eyes landing on Zangetsu propped up against the wall. He warily glared at it, and for a second he thought he saw it glint blue - through the red hues of the sunset.

Feeling exhaustion overcome his senses again, Ichigo fell back to the couch, all ready to go back to sleep.

His brain was capable of forming one last coherent question before Ichigo slid to oblivion,

_What did you want me to do, Tensa Zangetsu?_

* * *

><p>When Ichigo came to again, this time in the soft light of Seireitei's dawn, all he would remember of the conversation and waking up after would be a random screech of a cat and a lone glimmer of blue amongst swirling colors of red.<p>

* * *

><p><strong>Hmm. Thanks for reading! Thoughts?<strong>


	4. Clearup

**A/N: *points* Look, a new chapter! **

* * *

><p>Ichigo was grumpily strolling along the marketplace roads of Seireitei, finishing up the reminder of his standard-issued breakfast(two pieces of triangular rice cake, a spring roll and a cup of sweet energy drink). He could see the rustles of the day starting up in places: half-asleep shinigamis with brooms frantically sweeping the sides of the road; colorful vendors setting up their booths; stray cats being chased out of garbage cans. So different it was here. Karakura's mornings that he was used to were eerily quiet, taking out his father's daily display of idiocy out of the equation.<p>

Two of the road-sweeping shinigamis stared at him apprehensively from a distance. Ichigo's stared back, scowl deepening. The two paled and looked away before turning around and scuffling off.

Of course his reputation as a ryoka who threw the entire of Seireitei into a state of disarray, substitute shinigami who drew all of the captains out of Soul Society and current seated officer with unknown official power had receded him. Among many thoughts that came to him, one of them was that at least no one would _dare _to give him crap about the color of his hair.

* * *

><p>When he had woken up in the morning, there were no trace of the wariness from the day before. Sky outside the living room window was full with pastel colors, sun starting to brighten up the day. He had a feeling that he had lost something important during the night, but didn't bother figuring out what since he had Zangetsu and nothing he could tell was missing from his traveling pack.<p>

He had found a thick, tattered, grimy book the size of his school textbook at the foot of the front door. Lying on top of it was a small note that read _'Use it well. If you ruin it, you pay hell.'_ He didn't recognize the seemingly hurried, spiky scrawl it was written in; it was on the other side of the spectrum from the large cursive '15' on the note before. Kladias's this time? Kind of sounded like her.

Turning his attention back to the book, he saw the title: _'Seireitei: Detailed Guideline to Life as a Shinigami'_. Nope, he didn't want to read it already.

He tossed the note on top of the dresser nearby and carried the book back to the couch, where he sat down and laid the book down onto the table in front. He opened the book halfway and started skimming through the tiny, crammed printing.

Half a minute later, he jumped up and threw the book down onto the floor with far more force than necessary, where it landed with a heavy thud. _Was this a joke?_ Who needed to be taught with painstaking detail on how to open doors to senior officers' offices as not to interrupt the said officers inside? Or what to say in the case he was caught taking a nap while on duty? Or - heavens forbid - how to use the bathroom, _female and male section of the facility both?_ Not him, that's for sure. _Detailed _Guideline. It was unnerving how literal the title of the book was.

_'Well, she said to use it well, not to read through it all,' _he thought to himself as he got up, secured Zangetsu to its place on his back and stepped out the front door.

* * *

><p>Returning to the present - Ichigo was lost. He had walked past the length of the marketplace and entered the more desolate roads that seemed to lead to the Gotei 13 barracks. Fifteen minutes later, he hadn't bumped into a single person ever nor could he locate any familiar reiatsus anywhere near. It was if there was a thick barrier between him and his ability to sense. His heart dropped a little - was he <em>that<em> terrible when it came to sensing reiatsu in non-battle situations?

Endless starch-white walls on the either side of the road freaking him out slightly now, Ichigo was ready to double back to the marketplace when he saw two figures appear out of a corner fifty feet in front of him. He recognized the bigger one immediately - how could he not? - as Kenpachi. Ichigo shivered as Kenpachi locked eyes with him, a satisfied grin that had been gracing his sharp, demonic features widening.

To his surprise, he recognized the figure next to Kenpachi to be Kladias, who appeared to be muttering curses and flailing her arms trying to bat giggling Yachiru off of her head and shoulders. Yachiru was having great fun thoroughly one-upping Kladias, using shunpo to disappear and reappear just in time to dodge and tease the hands trying to grab hold of her.

Spotting Ichigo, Yachiru threw her hands up in the air, letting out a loud, painfully high-pitched _"ICHIIIIIIIIIIII-BERRY!"_

Before Ichigo had the time to tell her to shut up for the sake of his eardrums, Kladias saw her chance and took it; she stopped walking, and fastest he have seen her yet, her arm bolted up to grab Yachiru's ankle, lifted it up and threw the kid cartwheeling above the side wall in a whirl of black, pink and an even higher pitched squeal.

The second Yachiru's squeal faded, Kladias let out a loud shriek, annoyance apparent. Eyes closed, she ran a hand through the loose strands of her hair and sighed. Reopening her eyes, she caught both Kenpachi and Ichigo staring at her blankly and snapped,

"That _thing'_s a pest!"

Kenpachi let out a bark of laughter, "Too bad she'll be back."

Right on the cue, Yachiru landed on Kladias's shoulders - one leg on each side - with a soft rustle of fabric. Kladias's arms shot up, but this time, Yachiru caught them midair.

She chirped, "Aw, com'on, Dia-chan! I won't move, I promise!" with that, Yachiru let go of the arms, looked upside down onto Kladias's scowling face and stuck her pinkie out in front of her face, obviously offering a pinkie promise.

Kladias scoffed, shook her head back so that Yachiru was forced to straighten up, and stuck both her hands into the pocket of her hakama. Yachiru squabbled about unfinished pinkie-promise but wrapped her arms around Kladias's head and rested her chin on it, and did stay still. So did Kladias.

Kenpachi looked mildly amused throughout the whole thing. Ichigo found it half horrifying and... funny, fine. Managing to keep his face straight, he found his voice,

"So, what have you two been up to?" he immediately hoped that he didn't sound probing or demanding.

Kladias opened her mouth, but it was Yachiru who giggled, "Sucking up!"

"Hey kid, I prefer to call it winning him over." Kladias glared up and growled.

_Ooookay,_ that could mean a lot of things. He noticed the bandage wrapped around the full length of Kladias's neck and he blurted out,

"What happened to your neck?"

"He," Kladias jerked her chin towards Kenpachi, "happened."

_She didn't, she possibly couldn't have... _Ichigo felt his eyes widen and before he could stop, he blurted out yet again, "A hickey?"

The reactions were instantaneous: Kladias's dark eyebrows shot up, her dark red eyes wide, mouth bared her teeth and then let out a batch barking laughter, her shoulders shaking. Yachiru squealed when she almost fell off. Kenpachi's grin disappeared from his face, replaced by a grim look, and his steely gray eyes got to boring a permanent hole in Ichigo's own two eyes. All while a crimson blush consumed Ichigo's face whole.

_Uh-oh._

Kladias had stopped laughing. She turned her head to take a look at Kenpachi. A grin formed on her face. Then she turned towards Ichigo(in all his scarlet glory), and the grin transformed into a full-face, ear-to-ear display of pearly white teeth.

"His _sword_ happened, Kurosaki. I didn't to sleep with him to win him over. And I completely forgot that you're a hormonal teenager." she ended that with a widen of her already impossibly wide grin.

_Oh._ Ichigo cursed his face to turn back to normal. He covered, "Well, you should've made it clear. Implications were _crystal._"

Kladias mused, "Of course. Because it just _has_ to happen everytime."

Ichigo scowled at her - was she being sarcastic, or was there truth to that? He still didn't know how Seireitei functioned...

Still feeling the death-glare boring into him(what was _wrong_ with him? Ichigo made an honest, mistake!), Ichigo turned to Kenpachi with an apologetic grin on his face, his hands raised in front of him in sign of defeat,

"I... am sorry?" _Lame, but true._

Shit, he was not, _not _looking for another fight with Zaraki Kenpachi. Last one nearly offed him.

Silence. Still an unwavering glare.

"AWWWWWW, you made Kenny mad, Ichi!" With that, Yachiru hopped over from Kladias's to Kenpachi's shoulder, earning herself the death-glare from him and returning it with a bright, happy smile.

To Ichigo's horror, Kladias chuckled and punched Kenpachi on the shoulder none too gently, "Loosen up, comrade. Grow a sense of humor."

"Che," Kenpachi finally closed his eyes and jerked his chin up, looking up to the sky. The reiatsu around him remained unchanged.

"Good. Then we'll get going, Later, Kenpachi!" with that, Kladias turned her head towards Ichigo.

Ichigo let out a surprised yelp as Kladias suddenly grabbed him by the front scruff of his shihakusho, running while dragging him backwards.

* * *

><p>"The hell was that?" Ichigo exclaimed when Kladias finally let him down some minutes later.<p>

Kladias started walking, gestured for him to follow, and then gave an answer, "One more second and he would've been ready to swing his damn sword. _Again._" she sighed, and resumed, "Mind you, I like fighting, but it kind of tires me out after 12 straight hours."

Catching up to Kladias, Ichigo repeated, uncertain if he'd heard that right, "_12 straight hours_ you fought with him? What the hell for?"

"Fun." Kladias flashed him a grin.

Shaking his head in defeat, Ichigo mumbled, "You guys are unbelievable."

Face becoming serious, Kladias spoke, "Besides, I got him to agree to support the formation of the training division. Not too bad for 12 hour's work." She stretched her arms up to the sky.

Ichigo turned his attention to his surroundings - deserted roads again, unremarkable walls that he could easily get lost. Again.

Something occurred to him, "Wait a second - what support for the formation of training division?"

"Oh, I forgot to tell you. Shitloads happened yesterday." Kladias groaned, and then continued,

"Idiots at the Central 46 are backtracking. They were freaking out because they found that there were some skipped measures when they signed the waver that agreed on the formation of the training division. The last time it was formed - some three centuries ago - it brewed up one hell of a fight among all other 13 divisions that led to a mass destruction. Only yesterday some undersecretary uncovered that piece of information.

"So, they don't want another fight, or at least want to cover up their own asses in the case one breaks out. I have to have official, _written _support from all 13 divisions' captains in order to let the show begin."

_It made sense, _Ichigo thought. Disclaimers were what organization lived by in material world too. "So what happens if you don't get the written support?"

Kladias snarked, "According to the protocol, the formation of the division is prohibited. I plan to argue a change in that."

Ichigo pondered and asked, "And you're the one who's starting up all the business with the training division?"

"Yup."

"Why? It's a mess."

Kladias answered with a grim face, "Seireitei needs it."

Ichigo was puzzled. It was all great and noble that she wanted to improve the standards of Seireitei's shinigamis. But why? She hadn't been here for any major wars, if she's been around for only a year. As far as he new, she didn't witness any of the unnerving events that shaped Seireitei into what it was now.

Pushing heavy thoughts out of his head, he grinned and mused, "Or you just like being called a captain; how would you be addressed as the ultimate apex of the power without forming a brand new division yourself?"

Kladias glared at Ichigo, growled, and rubbed an eye with her hand, "Nope, but it reminds me of one more thing - our titles may change pretty soon."

Ichigo wasn't expecting that, "How come?"

"Kuchiki wouldn't quit whining about it." obvious dislike when she said the name out loud.

Ichigo was pretty sure it wasn't Rukia, but asked anyway, "Which one?"

"The one with a stick stuck straight up his ass. Kept quoting one historical document after another until Captain-Commander waved him off with an agreement."

_Yup, that'd be Kuchiki Byakuya for you._ Despite the changes past two years brought to him, he and the protocols were still close friends.

"Then what'll be the new titles be?" Ichigo hoped for something good...

Kladias grinned, possibly relieving a good memory, "Well, I challenged Kuchiki to come up with the new titles. So he mustered up what I think was all the creativity he had in him and made a suggestion."

_Bad feeling. _"Anything good?"

"Guess."

"Tell me already!" Ichigo snapped, anxious to know.

"Trainer Kurozachs, Assistant Trainer Kurosaki. _Trainer._ It would've been funny if he hadn't been completely serious about that." Kladias chuckled.

Ichigo groaned. Not only it was the least creative title one could think of for... well, the training division, he would sound like he was assisting in training damn Pokemons for real.

"Tell me that didn't happen." _Seriously._

"It did," seeing the horrified look on Ichigo's face, Kladias held up a hand, "hold on a sec. It happened, but the titles didn't pass. Good thing Commander General had a thing for eloquence.

"Colonel Kurozachs, Lieutenant-Colonel Kurosaki. How'd you like that?" Kladias grinned at him.

"Hell lot better than 'Trainer'." _Relief._

Kladias chuckled and for a second, Ichigo saw a soft, genuine smile on her face - not a face-splitting grin nor all-teeth predatory one.

As if something had occurred to her, Kladias held up her right hand in front of her, palm facing up. Twitch of her fingers, and the hand held what seemed to be a large pocket watch composed of bright blue flames. Another twitch of the fingers, the watch disappeared.

"8 o'clock already? Lieutenant-Colonel, we're on a tight schedule." She broke into a run.

"What schedule?" Ichigo grumbled as he fell into his pace beside her.

"Paperwork's an unforgiving bitch, and you're about to fall to her wrong side." Kladias transitioned into a series of shunpos.

* * *

><p><strong>So, couple stuff. I don't hate Byakuya! Actually, he's one of my favorite characters. Nor I think he's that uncreative, but seeing his artistic abilities... ehh. Sort of fits. I needed someone with obsession with protocols.<strong>

**And I obviously made up the titles Colonel and the Lieutenant-Colonel**.

**Bye 'till the next chapter!**


	5. Flip

**A/N: Thanks to those of you who've read, reviewed, favorited, and/or alerted this! Simple acts, granted, but it makes me happy :)**

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><p>At reaching the front of the training barrack, Ichigo stopped and turned around, smirking to himself. Some 15 seconds later, Kladias appeared in front of him and raised her eyes eyebrows at him. With two quick huffs of breath, she rubbed her hand briefly down from her chest to abdomen and trotted towards the second-story walkway of the building.<p>

As he caught up to her, Ichigo thought somewhat excitedly; _he beat her at shunpo! _And where it seemed Kladias was slightly worn out, he was not even out of breath. Possibly he was stronger than her?

Then it occurred to him that she had been battling Kenpachi for 12 hours straight and got out of it alive and well. Maybe beating her at shunpo after that wasn't that big of a deal. He felt his heart deflate a bit, and with a slight look of defeat on his face, snuck a glance at Kladias. _Shit._ She was giving him a look that told him _that's right, sucker._

He was about to say something about it when Kladias came to a stop in front of her office and stuck out an arm in front of him to stop too. She slid open the door with one move when Ichigo noticed the new note on it,

"Hey - they changed your title already."

The note that used to read 'Captain: Training Division' was now replaced with one that read 'Colonel: Training Division'.

Kladias took one look at it and scoffed, "More unnecessary the change is, quicker the 46 gaggle of freaks put it into action." she stepped into her office, "Get in, Kurosaki."

Ichigo did. And what he saw horrified him.

* * *

><p>Ichigo let out yet another stifling yawn. <em>At the rate this was going, his face was going to crack open in two. <em>Fifteen minutes into the work Kladias gave him, he had been grinding his teeth, regretting that he had taken the entire shinigami job in the first place. That was hours ago.

He was currently sitting on a large cough at the side of Kladias's office, reviewing a shinigami personnel file on the coffee-table in front of him. Stacks of boxes size and height of standard A4-print paper boxes stood either side of him.

Blinking twice, Ichigo got back to reading the file he had in hand. When he realized that he was reading the same sentence a couple dozen time without having a clue what it said, he threw the file down onto the table with a resounding _slap_ and threw himself back, arms outstretched above him. His spine cracked.

He threw a glare at Kladias, who was sitting facing him on the wide windowsill on the wall adjacent to him. She was leaning back against the side of the windowsill, one elbow supported on her leg bent at 90-degree angle closer to the window. The other leg was stretched in front of her, the bottom of her foot pressing up against the other side of the sill. She had a file in her hand too, and she didn't look so happy about it either.

_"ALL of them?" Ichigo had asked, hoping she wasn't serious._

_"That's what I said. Now get working." Kladias snapped before striding over to the window, plopping herself down, grabbing a folder from one of the two dozen 3-box stacks and opening it, leaving Ichigo open-mouthed at the foot of the couch._

_"But there's like a million of them!" Ichigo yelled at his equally large piles of folders._

_Kladias lifted her eyes from her folder and glared at Ichigo, "It's not too bad. Quit being dramatic, Kurosaki."_

_"The hell it isn't! When's the deadline? Today?"_

_"Yup!"_

_"TODAY? The hell's that supposed to happen?" Ichigo yelped, eyes widening even more._

_"Shut up! If I needed someone to sound like a broken record, I would've bought a damn parrot. Get to work!"_

_Ichigo huffed and stuffed the bouts of complaint bubbling out of his mouth. As stubborn as he could be, he had a sense when to stop and when not to._

_He propped Zangetsu onto the side of the couch and plopped down onto it. He grabbed a folder from one of the boxes, frowning. Each folder was basically a summary of life of a Seireitei shinigami; physical attributes, personality, life before the Academy, life(behavior, social standing, grades) at the Academy and finally current life as a shinigami. His job was to read over each and every one of them and fill out the evaluation forms based on their abilities with the four shinigami techniques: Zanjutsu(sword art), Hakuda(hand-to-hand combat ability), Houhou(speed and agility), and Kido(demon magic). Below that was a box that read 'Notes/Comments: '. Kladias had told him that he could write whatever he thought was necessary in there... Ichigo had half the mind to write snark comments, but he figured that they weren't worth his time._

Ichigo was in process of thinking up an way to pick a verbal fight with Kladias to get out of the boredom when a small black shape fluttered through the open window right at Kladias.

"AHH! _FUCK!_" she yelped.

With a flash of blue light, she swatted at it away from her face then gave it an almighty slap that sent it plummeting to the office floor. She jumped down from her windowsill and glared at it from a foot away with her fists clenched at her sides.

Ichigo saw the whole ordeal with a look of mild surprise on his face.

"If that _thing_ flies into my face again, it's dying." Kladias growled, obviously annoyed.

"It looks dead to me." Ichigo flatly stated.

Kladias threw him a dirty look and bent down to gingerly pick up the black shape with the tips of her index finger and thumb. Ichigo now saw that it was a hell butterfly, charred and smoking.

The wings of the poor creature twitched - Kladias flinched and threw it down again.

Ichigo snorted out a laughter; so she was afraid of a little _hell butterfly_.

Kladias glowered at Ichigo and spat, "It's fucking _CREEPY_ up close!"

"It's still a butterfly." No _way _Ichigo was letting go of that one easy.

Kladias turned her glare away and stomped on the butterfly(HARD) before turning away to go back to her perch at the windowsill.

"Isn't that thing supposed to carry a message?" Ichigo asked.

"Heard it already; it's welcome to die in peace." Kladias replied curtly, snatching her folder back up.

Before Ichigo can ask what the message was about, there was a knock on the office door.

"Come in." Kladias answered without looking up.

The door slid open, and the shinigami from yesterday who had brought Ichigo's traveling pack and Zangetsu to him stepped in. In his arms were two flat boxes of - _is that food?_ Ichigo was suddenly realized how hungry he was.

"Good afternoon, Colonel Kurozachs," the shinigami noticed Ichigo, "Lieutenant-Colonel Kurosaki! Azutora Nakade reporting from the 8th squad." _Ah, that was his name,_ Ichigo thought.

The shinigami gave the boxes in his arm a slight lift, "Captain Kyouraku sends his regards, special lunchboxes from the Syachi* Garden."

Kladias then turned her head towards the shinigami, "1 o'clock already? Oh, good. Put them on the coffee table and send Kyouraku my thanks, Azutora."

"Of course, ma'am."

He walked to the other side of the coffee table from Ichigo, set the boxes down on the minute space that wasn't occupied by folders, straightened up addressed to both Ichigo and Kladias this time, "Is there anything else you need, Colonel, Lieutenant-Colonel?"

Ichigo was about to order him to finish up the damn folders and evaluations for him, but Kladias pointed at the motionless hell butterfly and spoke first,

"Pick up that piece of rag over there and throw it in the trash. Or incinerate it. Get rid of it."

The shinigami walked over to it and picked it up with a look of puzzlement on his face. He turned to face Kladias and asked in an uncertain voice, "Ma'am, this is a hell butterfly bearing the insignia of the 6th squad."

"So?" Kladias had her head turned to her folder again.

"Perhaps it would be better if I were to return it to the squad's care centre?"

Kladias turned and glared at him, "Do whatever you want. Get it out of here."

He noticeably flinched, "Yes, ma'am."

As soon as the word "Dismissed." left Kladias's mouth, the shinigami hurried out of the office, his footsteps going away for few seconds before scrambling back to close the door and then fading away.

Ichigo frowned to himself. It was stark clear that the shinigami was terrified of Kladias. What did she do to have that happen? Throw him out to the forest too?

"Chow time, Kurosaki." Kladias's voice shook him out of his little reverie.

* * *

><p>Digging in, Ichigo once again noticed the silence. Kladias was eating her bento absolutely soundlessly, staring into space with her brows furrowed.<p>

Something occurred to Ichigo,

"Hey - that guy was from the 8th squad. I thought you were from the 9th."

Kladias jerked her head towards Ichigo, looking as if she was surprised to find him there. She swallowed the food she was chewing and answered, "Kyouraku's been generous enough to lend me some of his portion of manpower in forming the training division. Since it's not official yet, I have to get what I need from the official divisions. Which reminds me..."

She put down her chopsticks, reached inside her shihakusho and pulled out a rolled-up piece of paper. She unrolled all 3 foot of it flat onto the table and Ichigo saw that it was some sort of a consent form with 13 slots for signatures. All but four of them were filled.

"This obviously is where the written support from the captains of the Gotei 13 goes, in form of signatures," she ran her hand across the slots, "Commander General said that he would give his when all other 12 captains have. Unohana, Kyouraku, Kensei and Ukitake gave theirs right away when I asked, Rose, Shinji, Komamura, Hitsugaya after little chitchats. Now, for the others," she tapped the 2nd, 6th, 11th and the 12th,

"Soi Fong stubbornly believes that her squad _does not need extra training. _Also, she seemed to be a bit miffed at you for some reason." Kladias threw Ichigo a brief glare, "Haven't talked to Kuchiki yet; have no idea how to approach his textbook opinions."

Ichigo raised an eyebrow.

"Kenpachi signed his after I promised to 'play' with him from time to time - _keep on blushing, Kurosaki_," she added after seeing Ichigo's face, "Kurotsuchi, I think I could bribe him with piece of my hair or something equally bizarre for him to experiment with. Now _you,_" Kladias pointed her index finger straight at Ichigo, "try not to piss them off any more than you have already."

"Not like I _try._" Ichigo muttered. _No honorific on any of them?_ He wondered if it was because she was on close enough terms with all of them, or didn't give a damn about honorific. He guessed the latter.

Kladias glared, shrugged, rolled up the consent form and put it back into her shihakusho.

Seeing no harm in continuing on with a conversation, Ichigo spoke up, "So, the creepy guide book, it was you who gave me that, right?"

"Yup. Had fun reading it?"

"_No_. Too creepy. Only thing that it taught me was that common sense is all I need for anything and everything. So I did use it well." Ichigo threw in a piece of teriyaki into his mouth, chewed, swallowed and continued, "What was the part about paying hell about?"

"Oh, don't mind that," a chuckle, "a year ago, when I was in class, the instructor tried to get his class to memorize the whole thing. The hell I would. When he wouldn't give into the entire hoard of whining students, I set my copy on fire and threw it in his face." she grimaced, "He ran crying - quite literally - to the higher-ups and got me to listen to a whole bunch of jabbers about respect, responsibility, discipline and whatever else I've blocked out immediately. Landed me a month of cleaning duty with the 4th squad, which I skipped out of, no trouble. Good times." Kladias grinned.

Ichigo grinned along - that sounded like something he would've done in the exact situation. Especially the skipping out part.

* * *

><p>Kladias finished eating and stood up, yawning and stretching her arms above her head. She picked her empty bento box and chopsticks and tossed it into the garbage can beside the couch.<p>

She jerked her chin towards Ichigo's pile of folders, "How many are you through with, Kurosaki?"

Ichigo grimaced, "Almost three hundred. You?"

Grin, "Five hundred."

Eyes wide, Ichigo yelped, "WHAT? How did you do that?"

"Talent." Kladias gave him yet another all-teeth grin that Ichigo right away interpreted as _I am better than you._

She went back to the windowsill and put her finished folders into a box, evaluation forms into another. She then carried the two boxes to the coffee table and let them down with two _thud._

"Folders here, forms here. Deliver those to the side office of the Central 46 when you're done."

"What? You're leaving me alone to do the rest? _BY TODAY?_" Ichigo looked frantically around at the boxes - _thousands_ more folders left. His finished three hundred barely scratched the surface.

"Relax, Kurosaki. Not all of them."

"But you said-"

"I lied," Kladias grinned a mischievous grin that made Ichigo want to launch a good punch at her, "just wanted to see how fast you could work - which is a only bit above average."

Ichigo felt his temper rise as she continued,

"Deadline _is _today at 5 o'clock in the afternoon - _shut up and listen_," she shot at Ichigo as he opened his mouth, "we need a nice round number of one thousand. I've done five hundred, will match up nicely when you finish up the rest of your half."

Ichigo ground his teeth and glowered. He wanted to get out early, but didn't want to ask help from her to make that happen.

Seeing the resignation on Ichigo's face, Kladias began, "Excellent," she turned and started for the office door, "you can stay here 'till you're done, just shut the door properly when you leave. I'm going to sleep, see ya later."

"Hey! So you get to sleep while work my ass off?"

"I worked mine off already, remember?" she replied without looking back.

_Oh. Right. 12-hour fighting streak thing and then half a thousand files._

Kladias's slid open the door and with one hand still resting on the doorframe, she turned her head towards Ichigo.

"The hell butterfly from earlier was from Renji. Day after tomorrow, he and few other seated officers are holding a practice combat session, you and me are both invited. I'm going, and you're going only if you finish the files on time."

Ichigo's mood, which had brightened the moment he heard of the combat session, darkened again - _no way_ she was going to order him around. And apparently it showed on his face too, since Kladias chuckled as if finding his mood shift funny before stepping out and sliding the door shut behind her.

Ichigo turned back to the files with a newfound determination. He was going no matter what, but getting on the bad side of Kladias didn't seem like a smart idea, especially if she was going to get a chance to fight him. She had no problem intimidating people barehanded, but _with _a killing-stick in her hand? Variable X.

_At least he now had something too look forward to, _Ichigo thought as he flipped over another page of the file.

* * *

><p><strong>*Syachi = killer whale, according to Google Translate. Which should tell you that my Japanese skill is nonexistent ;_;<strong>

**Laters!**


	6. Squeals

**A/N: *points* Look! Another chapter! Short one, sorry, I'm feeling drained today.  
><strong>

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><p>Ichigo had <em>barely <em>finished filling out the rest of the evaluation forms on time, much to his distaste. The clock on the wall of Central 46 side office struck 5 o'clock just as he set down boxes over the platform to the unsmiling middle-aged female secretary who pursed her thin lips, dark eyes darting quickly between the walls and his unnaturally bright head of orange spikes. Ichigo had looked around the room to see that all of the furniture and wall hangings were black and white with occasional trims of solemn(and boring) colors of brown and red. Did she think that his hair was an unsightly decoration to this place?

As ridiculous the notion was, she stayed quiet and he wasn't about to start a bout of pointless argument with a fussy old lady.

He stepped out of the side office and started walking at random. He wasn't told what to do after delivering the paperwork, so Ichigo figured that he had rest of the day to himself. By his count, he had spent about 9 hours with the folders, enough to fill up one day's average working hour in the material world. He blinked and rubbed his aching eyes, grumbling loudly about when he would finally get a chance to combat for work.

Few minutes later, he spotted a couple of shinigamis coming towards him from afar. At closer inspection, Ichigo saw that they were two teenage girls his sisters' age, one with waist-length wavy dark brown hair and the other with a pale-blond side ponytail that came down to her shoulder. The brown-haired one noticed him first; her eyes widened surprise followed by recognition and she gave her friend a hard nudge. The blond girl yelped, glared at her friend and then focused onto Ichigo's face, a confused look on her face that turned too into recognition when her friend leaned into her ear to whisper.

Ichigo half expected them to turn around and bolt in the other direction like a couple of frightened rabbits, but instead they smiled and straightened themselves up, the brown-haired one brushing and tossing her hair back with both hands, the blond combing through her ponytail with her fingers and giving a small frown when she caught a knot. Then more whispering to each other.

_Drat._ It was Ichigo who was contemplating on bolting on the other direction now. He already hated whatever situation he was walking towards to.

Too late now.

Ten feet apart, the two smiling girls came to a halt, gave a deep bow and then shouted in unison, "Good afternoon, Lieutenant-Colonel Kurosaki!"

Coming to a halt himself, Ichigo replied stiffly, definitely lacking the enthusiasm they had, "Good afternoon."

Straightening up from the bow, their visibly sparkled with utter admiration. The brown-haired girl clasped her hands in front of her, then positively squealed,

"Oh, Kurosaki-san! We've heard _so much _about you! My name is Senade Nia, my friend here is Mei Yukiko, we're both from the 10th division. How lucky are we to come across an honorable officer such as you! We've been _dying_ for the chance. You see, we've been trying to get stronger, hearing that you have gone from a mere human being to a bankai-wielder in matter of weeks! I mean, a _bankai?_ Only the few strongest ones of the noble clans, once in a _thousand _years if lucky, are believed to be born with the ability to perform a bankai! But you? It's just _amazing! SO AMAZING!_" her clasped hands, which had been inching up and up ever since she started speaking, was now pressing up right below her lips.

All of that had come out incredibly rapidly, in one breath, leaving Ichigo's quite winded. He caught the bit about him being a 'mere human being' before and didn't know if he was insulted or not. Before he could decide, the blond one spoke - rather, squealed up,

"_Everyone_ is so impressed with you, Kurosaki-san! Us and so many of our friends are dying to start training with you! We were _devastated _when we heard that the plans to open up the training division was pushed back because of some document," sad puppy eyes, instantly replaced by happiness, "but we're excited! I have never been good with a zanpakuto. No matter how many times I ask, it won't tell me its name," sad puppy eyes again, instantly replaced by happiness _again,_ "But with _you _teaching us, we'll be able to do so many things we haven't been able to before! I just can't wait to get a bankai of my own so I can show to my friends! _Can't wait!_" Ichigo inwardly cringed as the two girls let out a pair of high-pitched squeals of absolute giddiness.

Blinking twice, Ichigo flatly spoke, "Uh, looking forward to working with you two too." _That was a lie. He was dreading it._

The girls looked as if they've been instantly stuffed with a lifetime supply of happiness. Before they could launch into another series of squeals, Ichigo interrupted,

"I gotta go, uh, to a meeting. Kind of late, actually."

Horrified looks came across the two girls' faces, and they simultaneously broke into high-pitched stutterings. Ichigo heard "don't let us keep you", "sorry to make you late" and "hope you don't get into trouble" among the squabbles of other squealy words. The blond girl elbowed her friend then they let out a not-quite-an-unison of "Have a good afternoon, Lieutenant-Colonel Kurosaki!" and they both scuttled past him, still squealing. Several seconds passed by, and then Ichigo was left standing in a quite sudden silence, blinking to himself.

He shook his head side to side, trying to get his thoughts back to place. All those high-pitched noise had him feeling as if there was a hive of wasps nesting in his skull. He walked on.

* * *

><p>When his head stopped buzzing, Ichigo was able to think through the girls' words properly. As innocent have been, they quickly filled him up with anger. <em>So that was what he was to them here, a mere human being who achieved bankai in a few weeks. Not someone who came to the brink of death so many times in process, not someone who painstakingly defeated enemies the Seireitei were too stupid to see to themselves. <em>Not only that, but they thought that with some training, they would easily become powerful. And be absolutely happy with it.

Ichigo ground his teeth.

His power came from his desire at the core of his true being, his desire to protect the ones around him; family, friends, occasional souls who he got close to in the material world. When he strived to get his shinigami power back and achieve and bankai, saying that he was desperate for a way to save Rukia from execution was an _unforgivable _understatement. He didn't even _want_ to think of a word for how he felt back then underneath the determination he put on his face. He didn't ask for his Hollowification. Mugetsu had been the very last resort against Aizen.

Speaking of Aizen, he had lost his power to the Hougyoku due to his desire to become an ordinary shinigami. Having born a completely different level from all others had molded him into a sociopath that self-destructed in the end.

When Ginjou - with the name, came a painful stab in the heart - had told him that the Fullbringers wanted to relieve themselves of their powers, Ichigo had understood. Then the true plot revealed and then hell brew up to throw everything haywire, but he knew, _knew _that the statement was true to some extent to anyone. Sometimes normality was all he wanted that it hurt.

He had gone through so much, lost so much to gain the power he had. The world imploded on him the last time he lost it. He had chosen the power to protect over normality. And here they were, squealing excitedly about how they would be able to show off to their friends.

_But they haven't seen what he have, nor have they been through what he had been through._

True. They were just to ignorant.

Stumbling out of his riot of anger, he forced himself to breath properly. He looked down to his hands and saw them clenched up starch-white. He urged himself to relax, pried his hands open and gasped when he saw four small crescents of crimson on both his palms. His nails had dug in. He felt drained.

Quite embarrassed of the state he was in just moments ago, he looked around to see if there had been any audience. Instead, he found himself dead-center of the 5th squad's front entrance.

He turned and stepped in without a second thought. Nothing to do, he might as well distract himself with the dumbed down version of Shinji's reason for his return as one of the Gotei 13 captains.

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><p><em><strong>Have<strong>_** I gone OOC? I think so. Oh well...**


	7. Onwards

**A/N: Ready, set, read on!**

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><p>Ichigo grabbed the handle of Zangetsu with both hands, raised the sword above his head and struck the rock in front of him with a resonating <em>clang.<em>

"What the hell Zangetsu! Talk, you bastard!" _Ow. His hands hurt._

He was currently seating cross-legged on one of the rocks of the barrack's garden, facing the forest. Aside from occasional shinigamis flitting by the building carrying stacks of boxes and whatnot, the place was quiet, so he figured that he could try meditating and get his zanpakuto to talk to him. So far, the cold piece of metal was being unresponsive, as it had been ever since he got his shinigami powers back.

Wind blew, rustling through the forest. Leaves of the trees shook, grass rippled gently and the surface of the small pond wavered. Clouds drifted by lazily in the sky that was starting to bleed scarlet from the horizon. _His zanpakuto wouldn't blab a single word._

True, Ichigo had never been much of a talker with his zanpakuto spirit. Most of their conversations were done in life-and/or-death situations between the two of them trying to slash each other into pieces. But besides that, what seemed like a lifetime ago, Ichigo had managed to drag tidbits out of Zangetsu and the vice versa every once in a while. A random sentence or two of opinions or advices or a slight rushing feelings of emotion. Past month, nothing in, nothing out, _none._ And it was starting to get on his nerves.

Taking in a deep breath, Ichigo draped his oversized zanpakuto across his knees again and rested one hand on the tip of the blade, the other on the base. He closed his eyes and tried to blank out his mind...

Few hours ago when he dropped into the 5th division in search of Shinji, he was met instead with the vice-captain of the division - he still didn't know her name, only remembered her with irk in his mind as Aizen's former vice-captain - with the news that Captain Hirako was out on duties. After that, Ichigo had run just about _all over _Seireitei in search of a single soul he knew. For some of them, like Kensei and Renji, he was told they were away on work, for others, he simply couldn't find them. His ability to track down reiatsu seemed to be getting worse, which he didn't think was possible. Maybe he should ask the Kukkaku woman to shoot him into Seireitei again, just to see if his sense of reiatsu would be any better. He had been able to keep regular tabs on the crew when they had rocketed in from the sky on a rescue mission.

He wondered how his friends and family were doing in the material world. After their memories had returned to how they were before Tsukishima messed with them, did they simply resume their daily lives? Schoolwork, TV shows, cooking dinner - or a semblance of one, in Inoue's case - and city festivals? _Were they safe?_

He knew that there wasn't such thing as a complete, impregnable safety anywhere in any of the worlds he had been in. Karakura town would be as safe as anywhere else, which wasn't a calming thought.

Besides, it was _him_ who had brought on trouble to his home town all these time. Or was it? Aizen said something about Karakura being rich in reiatsu, thus the entire town being the crucial ingredient in creating the King's Key.

King's Key, which got him thinking about the Hougyoku. Aizen, eyes dark bottomless orbs. Black night of Hueco Mundo, further contrasting the stark white of the sand and the Las Noches. Flash of oppressive black light, followed by a green one. Azure sky painted on the inside of the dome-

_A bone-rattling howl ripping through him._

_Pitch black. Silence. A presence, far off._

_Blue-grey eyes staring at him. In them, an intense emotion._

Ichigo choked, his eyes flying open. _That was absolute terror in Tensa Zangetsu's eyes. _And the howl... he'd heard that exact howl before. But where?

"ARGH!"

With that, Ichigo sprang up to his feet, grabbing Zangetsu by the handle and flinging it away from him. The huge sword soared through the air in a low arc and landed fifty feet away in the grass without making a sound.

Ichigo pointed at it accusingly and then yelled, "When I say _talk,_ I mean actually _TALKING! _Howling and making frightened wild puppy eyes at me DON'T COUNT!"

Still fuming, he stumped over to it and the gave it a hard kick. Sharp pain lit up his foot. Ichigo yelped and clutched his aching toes, almost falling over but regaining his balance at the last second. He glared at Zangetsu; it glinted up at him, bathed in orange light. _Orange?_

Ichigo looked up to the sky, and saw that it was now full on scarlet fading into dark navy of the night. _Sunset already? _It felt like minutes ago that he closed his eyes last. It was shortly before 7 o'clock that he sat down to try to get his zanpakuto spirit to talk to him. It must be around 9 o'clock now. _Two freaking hours!_ He couldn't believe a howl and wild puppy eyes that told him nothing ate up that much of his time.

He gave Zangetsu one last glare and the picked it up to heave it onto its usual spot. As he started for his quarters to call it a day, he made a mental note to ask someone about the bizarre behavior of his zanpakuto spirit.

* * *

><p>The next day, shortly after noon, Ichigo was knocking on one of the doors to the 9th division's living quarters.<p>

He had woken up early, gotten himself his breakfast, sat down on the exact same rock to try to pry something out of his zanpakuto spirit again. Almost immediately after he closed his eyes, it came again; _same howl, same frightened blue-grey eyes._ His eyes flew open again, only to find himself that more than_ five hours_ had passed by with that useless vision.

Furious at himself for letting the zanpakuto eat up so much time, he got himself onto finding Kladias. No one told him so, but he supposed that he was to report to work. It was then he figured that he had no idea what day of the week the day was. Another dumb question to ask along with his zanpakuto-spirit question.

He found the Colonel's office empty and then realized that he had no idea where she might be next. He had unceremoniously stuck his head into one of the ground-level office in the barrack and asked in a yell where he could find Kladias, scaring the light out of the petite dark-haired woman.

She had squeaked out at him that the Colonel might be at the 9th division, in her quarters or her other office there. Ichigo had stared at her questioningly(further fright to the poor woman) before remembering that Kladias was a 3rd-seat of the 9th division as well as Colonel as the training division. With a mutter of thanks, he stormed away, mad at himself for not thinking of that himself.

The door he was knocking on was Kladias's living quarter, according to one of the shinigami he bumped into in the hallway of the barrack. _That one too seemed terrified to be in his presence. _Ichigo briefly wondered if all of them reacted the same to higher-seat officers, or just to him.

She wasn't at her office, so he was trying here.

_Knock-knock-knock. Knock. Knock-knock._ He's been knocking for a while, still no answer. Maybe she wasn't here?

_Knock-knock-knock-knock-knock-knock-knock-knock-knock-knock-_

_WHAM! _The door almost shook off its frame.

Ichigo flinched, his fist flying away from the door. That was something heavy(a rock size of a soccerball?) slamming into the door from the other side.

Annoyed growl of a voice roared right after,

"Shut up!"

_Yup, she was in there._

"Yo! If you're going to be knocked out for a full damn day, at least leave instructions to me on what to DO!"

"Get lost!"

"Hey, what-"

"SCRAM!"

"But-"

"SCAT!"

"Then just-"

_"FUCK OFF!"_

He opened his mouth to demonstrate that she was NOT the only one who could pull off the aggressive side of an insult match, but a pair of strong arms jerked him off to the side, effectively shutting him into silence.

Ichigo looked up to find Kensei. _Man, didn't he look pissed._

"Shut yourself up, Kurozachs!"

"You!"

_"I MEAN it, Kladias!_"

_"Go DIE!"_

_"Hey, brat-"_

_"NOW!"_

_BAM! _Kensei's fist landed on the door; Ichigo was impressed that the door held.

Force of a rhino ramming into a tree shook the door in reply. Something cracked.

A vein pulsed on Kensei's neck. He turned around and growled; Ichigo caught a resigned look on his face. The captain took off in quick strides and Ichigo followed the suit with his eyebrows raised.

"You're just going to leave her like that?" Ichigo started, striding along.

Kensei closed his eyes and scoffed, "Got a better idea?"

_Not really._ "Drug her to sleep?"

"You volunteering, kid?"

_He would have to get near her for that._ "Hell no. So is that what the rest of your squad get to get away with or is she getting a special treatment?"

Kensei threw him an annoyed look, "No, and she's NOT getting a special treatment. She's got hellhounds to face when she sobers up."

Ichigo's eyebrows shot up and yelped, "She's _drunk?_"

Looking straight ahead, Kensei gave a small shrug, "That's my guess. First time she's being _that_ bratty."

_Huh,_ Ichigo thought. Then it wasn't the monthly 'business' the girls had. Karin grew quiet with retractable porcupine quills, Yuzu got uncomfortably sappy. It was a small relief to know that his superior didn't get into the state she was in now every month. But then, how often did she drink, if Kensei's guess was correct?

The white-haired captain glanced at Ichigo sideways and asked, "Don't you have somewhere you have to be, Ichigo?"

Ichigo replied, a hand ruffling his orange spikes, "Not really. Nothing to do, either. Or not; it's _her,"_ he jerked a thumb back, "job to try to order me around, so I do have the option of just scramming, scatting and whatever else that flew out of her mouth."

A snort, "Then go to the 6th squad; the vice-captain's assembling a team for hollow disposal in Rukongai. He'll probably let you tag along, and I think you two have some stuff to catch up on."

Now_ that, _sounded hell lot more fun than hours of paperwork the day before.

"Thanks, Kensei! I'll see you around."

With that, Ichigo bolted his way out of the building.

* * *

><p><strong>Hmm... pace too slow? Not? I'd better get weaving onto the plot soon anyhow.<strong>

**Thanks for reading, and laters! :)**


	8. Gatherings

**A/N: Ah, more fun.**

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><p>Ichigo threw himself onto his back on the green grass, hands linking beneath his head. He stared up at the sky; the day was not sunny, just bright and slightly cloudy - perfect condition for exercises such as practice combat sessions today. His zanpakuto lied beside him.<p>

He was currently at the center of an almost perfectly circular grass field about kilometer straight across. Dark forest of tall trees and small bushes encircled the field, and craning his head upwards, he could see the Soukyokou hill. The usual sense of uncomfortableness crept up to him, but he batted it away forcefully. He wasn't going to mope over that old event, not now. _Hell_ no.

Yesterday afternoon, he indeed had tagged alongside Renji and half a dozen shinigami on a hollow disposal mission. It has been a long time since he'd been around his red-haired comrade, and it felt simply comforting. Renji was someone who had gone through much of what he'd gone through himself, large part of that being the huge emotional hit he took from the announcement of Ruika's execution.

No heartfelt words were exchanged, only a standard how-do-you-do and usual bouts of bickerings, but the silence of camaraderie between the two of them for the most while was all that was needed to drive worries out of Ichigo's mind. The other shinigamis on the team, all large men, said nothing more than necessary. They avoided eye contact with Ichigo, as if scared, but he was starting to get used to the treatment.

But when they got to the site of the hollow-sighting, they had run into a big and strange problem - the hollow reiatsu was in the air, exact coordinates showing up on the transportable monitor they carried, but there were no signs of the hollow itself anywhere. The eight of them scoured the area - a large, old forest full of small animals, birds and low-riding branches - for it for two hours straight and came up with nothing. Renji had told Ichigo that it was normal for hollows to be gone from the site by the time shinigami got there, but never there had been a time when the team of shinigami stood on the exact coordinate it was supposed to be on and didn't run into it.

The vice-captain had given the techie of the team a good angry yelling for being incompetent with the machine, but Ichigo thought otherwise. The problem was the hollow, not the machine, definitely not the poor shinigami who got scolded his head off. They had returned to Seireitei straight to the 12th division, but by the end of the day, they still had no idea what went down at the site.

_Damn,_ Ichigo had thought. He was hoping that Zangetsu would feel more communicative if they were out fighting the hollows together.

Renji invited Ichigo along for dinner where he would meet up with few friends from his time at the shinigami academy. Ichigo had accepted, quite happy to get included to a part of Renji's past. The two of them had gone to a restaurant - a popular hangout for the shinigami -, met up with the said group of friends, and had a good time joking around and bantering all throughout the meal. Ichigo wasn't exactly charmed, but they were nice and fun enough.

Ichigo excused after the meal when the group of them got serious about drinking the night away. He told himself that he wasn't legal yet in the material world, but the actual reason behind it was that he had drunk once before and hated the giddy feeling that came with it. He didn't want to be out of control, not with the real monsters out there not only at night, but anytime, anywhere. He was a bit miffed about missing out what he guessed was the most fun part of the night. But nothing he could do about that now.

* * *

><p>"AH! <em>Gerroffofme!" <em>Ichigo yelped, driving his head down onto the ground as much as he can. If he wasn't mistaken, he was half a foot from being suffocated by a pair of... _GAH!_

"Aww, Ichigo, not like I'm actually _on _you!" Rangiku, who had been crouching at his head looking at him upside-down with her enormous blobs of flesh(...breasts) threatening to fall out of her already-loose shihakusho, teased in a sing-song voice, complete with a girlish giggle at the end. She straightened up nevertheless, letting Ichigo hastily spring up to his feet to face her.

Damning the full scarlet state he knew his face was in, Ichigo snapped at still-giggling Rangiku, _"Don't do that again!" _he yelled as he bent down to pick up Zangetsu and heave it onto his back.

"But it's too fun!" Rangiku flashed him a coy smile, a wink and continued before Ichigo could protest, "How did you like my kiss, Ichigo-san?"

Ichigo blinked, horrified - _wait, when the hell did she kiss him?_

Then remembered with relief what she might actually be talking about, "So the note _was_ from you?"

"Of course! I wrote the numbers, got sweet Kladias-chan to draw the strawberry for me, and most importantly, the kiss was mine!" She clasped her hands in front of her, pale blue eyes wide and expectant, "So did you like it?"

_Sweet..._ Kladias-_CHAN?_ The grumpy chick could be called many, _many _things, but _sweet _was NOT one of them. Just _no._ The only person Ichigo saw calling Kladias 'chan' was Yachiru(Dia-chan, to be specific), but she called everyone by weird nicknames.

Further blushing and remembering what could have been a knowing smirk on that Nakade shinigami, Ichigo started, _"No," _Rangiku's face fell, "and you got my name wrong."

Confused, Rangiku's voice rose in pitch, "Huhhh? But you're Ichigo, Ichigo-san! Ichigo, Ichigo! I got it right!" she cocked her head to the side, still saying 'Ichigo' under her breath as if to make sure.

Ichigo snapped, "It's _Kurosaki _Ichigo, not _Ichigo_ Ichigo." _Okay, that was lame, but whatever! _He didn't like being compared to a damn strawberry!

Rangiku stared at Ichigo with an incredulous look in her eyes, and burst out laughing. To Ichigo's surprise - and annoyance-, her laughter was joined by someone else's.

Fuming, Ichigo took a look around. His eyes fell upon Hisagi, who was standing behind slightly right to Rangiku-san, as the source of the second laughter. There were other people around also; the small, dark-haired female vice-captain of the 5th division, who was silently laughing behind with her hands covering her mouth, stood on the other side of Rangiku. Beside her, stood a quite slight blond shinigami - Ichigo remembered with a jolt as Ichimaru's former vice-captain - had his eyebrows raised, mirth in his icy blue eyes.

Ichigo glared at all four of them, and they straightened up their faces. Somewhat. They were still smiling.

"Oh, Ichigo, did you know that you're so _cute _when you blush like that!" Rangiku chirped. Ichigo felt his blush intensify and readied a retort, but Hisagi spoke up first, amused,

"Don't let her get to you like that, Kurosaki. She'll never stop." Ichigo looked over at Hisagi's semi-serious face. Rangiku giggled again. The two squealy girls from the day before yesterday came to Ichigo's mind and he wondered if it was Rangiku who set the example for them. _Probably._

He decided to let her go.

A cheery greet came from his left, and he looked over, "My name is Hinamori Momo, vice-captain of the 5th squad. Nice to finally be able to meet you officially, Kurosaki Ichigo-san!" She gave a slight bow.

_Ah, so that was her name._ Now Ichigo actually had bumped into her yesterday while he was looking for Shinji in his division, but he had left without a word right after getting "He's not here, working in field" out of her. He wondered if he'd been rude at the time.

He just nodded back at her.

The blond one spoke up flatly and Ichigo switched over his gaze, "Kira Izuru, vice-captain of the 3rd division." He followed that up with a curt nod, no sign of the previous laughter anywhere on his face. Ichigo nodded back at him too.

Rangiku positively glowed, unclasped her hands and clapped them back again, "Now we all know each other! Superb!"

Hisagi turned his head side-to-side and spoke, "Where are the others? It's few minutes to the designated meeting time."

Right on the cue, Ikkaku appeared out of nowhere fifty feet from them, his haughty sidekick from the same division on one side and a man(who looked suspiciously like a member of the yakuza) wearing black sunglasses on the other. Ichigo couldn't recall the latter from anywhere.

Rangiku squealed, "There's Ikkaku, Yumichika and Tetsuzaemon! Come on, let's go say hi!"

With that, she unceremoniously grabbed Ichigo by the bicep and dragged him over to the trio.

* * *

><p>Few minutes later, Ichigo was standing in a loose circle with a bunch of shinigamis who were plainly chatting among themselves.<p>

The haughty one(with _peacock feather _on his eyelashes?) was Ayasegawa Yumichika, 5th seat of the 11th division, the yakuza-looking one Iba Tetsuzaemon, vice-captain of the 7th division. Two women had arrived after and introduced themselves to Ichigo as Kotetsu Isane(holy _shit_ she was tall for a woman), vice-captain of the 4th division, and Ise Nanao, same of the 8th division. His head was spinning with all those new names to finally put on familiar faces.

Renji and Rukia appeared thirty feet away from the cluster of people and started walking over. Renji stumbled before righting himself back up, Rukia had her eyes closed with a resigned look on her face.

Opening her eyes and seeing Ichigo, a small but bright smile lit up Rukia's face,

"Hey, Ichigo."

He smiled back at her, "Hey, Rukia." he opened his mouth to say something else, but sight of Renji caught his eyes - _uh-oh. _Dark circles haunted underneath the redhead's eyes, skin had a pale pallor to it and he seemed to have trouble keeping himself upright.

When the couple of them got closer, Ichigo arched his eyebrows and truthfully commented, "You look like shit."

Renji let out a short, guttural groan and clutched his head with both his hands. He then muttered almost inaudibly, "I _feel _like shit."

"Fool, that's what you get for drinking the night away as if you are still in the academy!" Rukia scolded.

Renji stayed silent, and Rukia turned to Ichigo, "I had to _literally _drag him out of his quarters, this irresponsible idiot." she turned back to Renji, "You knew you had a rough day coming, _what were you thinking?"_

Kira and Hinamori walked up to joined their little circle; at seeing the state Renji was in, Kira's eyes widened and Hinamori gave a small yelp of horror. She commented with her hands clutched in front of her mouth, "Abarai-kun looks like he should stay in bed for the rest of the day, maybe even tomorrow. Why did you have to drag him out, Kuchiki-san?"

Renji grumbled something under his breath but it was Rukia who gave an audible answer, "It is because he was the one who proposed to the Central 46 the practice combat sessions. His presence is required for the event to commence."

From Renji's quiet grumbles, Ichigo only caught "shouldn't have" and "stupid protocols". Which made him smirk slightly.

All of a sudden, there were scattered greetings in various forms of "Good afternoon, sir". Ichigo turned his head around and saw Shinji, complete with his new captain's haori and slanted blond bangs, walking towards the bunch of them, greeting back nonchalantly. His face was grim.

"Yo, Ichigo, long time no see." _Ah, there it was, the freaky piano-toothed smile he sort of missed. Emphasis on 'sort of'._

Ichigo grinned back, "Same, Shinji. So the captains are coming too?" _Whoa, things could get interesting if so._

"No - I'm on babysitting duty. Lucky me." Shinji's face turned back into a grimace.

Ichigo snorted and looked around, and saw what now was a quite large gathering of people.

"Isn't it kind of dangerous to have half the top-seat forces off duty all at once?" Ichigo asked at no one in particular.

"It is. But Commander General more or less forced the higher seats to attend the session. Think of it as a test to the lower seats too - they need to practice how to handle the division without their superiors present." It was Shinji who replied; he continued in an annoyed snap, "Wake up, vice-captain Abarai! What's wrong with him, Hinamori?"

Hinamori squeaked out, "He's hungover, sir."

Renji, who had flinched up from his half-slumber as his name was called, saw Shinji staring at him disapprovingly and sank in to a slight bow, wincing, "My most sincere apologies, sir." he muttered out, voice quiet but still the loudest so far today. Ichigo felt slightly sorry for him - he seriously looked like he could use some time off. By himself. Lying face down. _Onto a toilet._

Shinji scoffed and waved him away. He sing-songed, "Ahhh, fine - can't be helped." then he whipped his head around to the others, who were now standing at a semi-circle around him and yelled out, "Alright. Who's missing?"

Hisagi spoke up from the right, "Vice-captain Sasakibe has refused to participate; vice-captain Omaeda mentioned yesterday that he had family business to attend to."

_Ichigo had no idea who those two were.._

"And the 12th division's vice-captain is most likely being surgically experimented or something, who knows," Shinji mused, and Ichigo silently agreed. He continued, "seems like you two," he glanced over at Ikkaku and Yumichika, "are the only non vice-captains signed up to show up. So that's twelve of you, nice even number." a second's rest, and then he added on, "Or not. Anyone know where our newest shining star had gone to?"

Ichigo blinked at Shinji in puzzlement; hearing the rest of the group silent, he supposed that other eleven pairs of eyes were doing more or less the same.

Scoffing once more, Shinji continued, "Oh, come on. Our brand new Colonel - I heard that she's already got her shikai with her recent personal training leave."

_Her?_ Kladias never brought up her zanpakuto when she talked to Ichigo. In fact, he had never even gotten a glance at it. _So she had gotten her shikai.._

"From who, sir?" Hisagi spoke up one of many questions Ichigo had, on his face, surprise.

Shinji raised his eyebrows - one disappearing beneath his lopsided bangs -, "Captain Zaraki mentioned in passing that she spontaneously 'grew claws'. I asked if he meant that she's gotten her shikai, got an affirmative out of him. She's your 3rd seat - she hasn't told you yet, Hisagi-kun?"

Hisagi grimaced and answered, "No, sir."

Shinji cocked his head, "Oh? Well, I was hoping that she would put on a show for us and liven up the day. It's been a while since anyone's zanpakuto had gone through a drastic change."

"Negative, sir," Hisagi answered again, glancing over to Renji, who appeared to be swaying on the spot with Rukia poking him awake, "vice-captain Abarai might not be the only one hungover today."

"So she _was_ drunk yesterday?" Ichigo blurted out.

Hisagi shrugged, "That was Captain Muguruma's hypothesis and I think he is correct - the entire squad heard her trying to heave her guts out last evening."

"But Kladias-chan doesn't drink!" Rangiku piped up from the opposite of the semi-circle, "No matter how many times I tried to get her to, she slapped them away. Last time I tossed her a bottle, she threw it at my head!" she patted the top of her wavy blond hair with an uncharacteristic scowl on her face, as if relieving a painful memory.

Ikkaku stepped up from the middle, his zanpakuto draped across his shoulders, "Then maybe the chick's dying off. Half a day fighting streak with our captain? Thought it was strange she was even breathing properly after." he directed a hard gaze at Shinji, "Can we get this thing started? I'm getting bored. Kurozachs chick is drunk, hungover, dying, I don't give a sh-"

_Something moved in Ichigo's peripheral vision-_

Next thing he knew, Ikkaku was flying face-first into the center of the semi-circle, where he crumpled into a heap, swearing up a shitstorm. Yumichika let out an unmanly yelp and rushed to his aid. Where Ikkaku was standing seconds before now stood Kladias, one leg still raised in an arc, frozen in the middle of a karate-kick. Both of her hands were tucked into the pockets of her hamaka. _She looked and was acting absolutely fine,_ if anyone asked Ichigo.

She slowly lowered her leg and straightened up with her feet wider than shoulder width apart, upper part of her body slightly slouching. She had a menacing aura around her.

_Yup, she looked absolutely normal._

Then she growled, whipping her head around at the eleven still-shocked faces, "I _wasn't_ drunk, I'm _not _hungover, and I fucking sure _am not dying! _Quit making stupid assumptions!"

Hisagi visibly slumped and spoke with a defeated note in his voice, "Good afternoon to you too, Kurozachs. If you're telling the truth, why didn't you report to duty this morning?"

Kladias growled, further frowning, "I did, just not to you. And I was working, believe it." she pointed an accusatory finger at Hisagi's '69' face tattoo, "And cover that thing up!"

Looking officially pissed, Hisagi started, "_What - NO, and address me by my title when you're-_"

Kladias interrupted, "I have a _reasonable _urge to beat the shit out of those couple numbers, which I'd be glad to give into any moment now." a little smirk appeared on her face and she lowered her voice to a quiet purr, "You don't have anything to cover it up with? Go crouch behind Rangiku then; I bet you'll find that _pre-tty_ agreeable, _vice-captain Hisagi._"

Ichigo watched in amazement as the said vice-captain's face, which had gradually been darkening ever since Kladias had interrupted him, exploded into a deep shade of magenta. He slapped a hand over his now-flaming forehead, face scrunched up, audibly groaning. Kira, who had been standing beside Hisagi, covered his mouth with his hand and doubled over. The rest of the people in the semi-circle had various expressions on their faces, which Ichigo generally interpreted to _'Yup, they're idiots.'_

Awkward silence.

Ichigo spotted Rangiku blinking innocently at everyone with a sweet smile on her face.

Shinji's voice swooped in to save the moment, "Ey, ey, cut that out, you two. Stop teasing your poor vice-captain, Kladias-chan."

"For now." Kladias retorted, a grin on her face. A set of sharper-than-normal canines glinted. Her bad mood from before seemed to have evaporated.

"Uhh.." Shinji looked around and Ichigo followed the suit. Ikkaku and Yumichika were still at the center of the semi-circle, the latter trying to persuade the former to stand up - unsuccessfully. Hisagi's face seemed to be returning to its original color, but Kira had sank down to the ground with his head buried between his knees, shoulders shaking. Everyone else appeared a bit weirded out by the entire situation.

Shinji whipped his head around to Kladias, his hair briefly fanning around his face, "Gee, do you _have _to wreck destruction where ever you show your pretty face? Everything was fine before you came by!"

Kladias's grin widened to reveal what seemed like all of her teeth , "If you say so."

"Captain Hirako, could we now proceed onto the actual combat session? We are running quite late on time." The petite woman wearing glasses who had been silent throughout pretty much everything - Ise, of the 8th division, was it? - , spoke up.

Shinji clapped his hands together, "Oh, yes, thank you for the reminder, Nanao-chan," the Ise woman grimaced at hearing the pet name.

The captain turned to face the entire semi-circle of people, "All right then, let's just suddenly plunge into the session. Here are the activities suggested by the Central 46," he pulled out a piece of paper from inside of his shihakusho, "I'll read them out, tell me what sounds fun to you bunch of bored people."

_Bored?_ With the craziness of the situation they all were in, Ichigo doubted that any of them were actually bored at the moment.

* * *

><p><strong>Yup, more fun, not much more happening. *smacks self*<strong>


	9. Raise your head,

**A/N: Alrighty, let's get going, folks.  
><strong>

* * *

><p>Ichigo was mildly surprised as Shinji read out a mundane list of warm-up activities that he never thought shinigamis would actually train with, starting with tag, hide-and-seek and on. On the other hand, he was <em>not <em>surprised when the twelve of them(Shinji stepped out of the discussion and Renji was finally splayed on the grass somewhere far off) couldn't come to a consensus about_ anything,_ not the team formation, the order of the games, and _hell no_ the rules of those games.

He was in the middle of an argument_(tag the body, not the shihakusho!) _with Tetsuzaemon, Hisagi and Ikkaku, last one now completely recovered and shouting his shiny head off, when he felt a heavy reiatsu slam down onto him. His knees buckled, but he kept himself upright. Rustles of fabric around him; _everyone?_

A split second later, the reiatsu lifted. Ichigo immediately straightened up, sprang himself around to face the source of the reiatsu and yelled, "What the hell was that?"

His eyes landed on Shinji's half bored, half irritated ones, twenty feet away from him. Shifting his focus, he saw that everyone seemed to be in the process of heaving themselves up from the grass.

_Hold on, not everyone - _he spotted someone coming to a full standing not far behind Shinji -

"Yup, that works too." Kladias drawled almost nonchalantly, back in what Ichigo had decided was her signature stance; upper body slightly slouching with her feet planted wide, hands tucked into the pockets of her hakama. Next to her was Rangiku, pushing herself up to her knees, a hand brushing a strand of wavy hair away from her face.

Ichigo saw both of Shinji's eyebrows dart below his bangs before the blond whipped his head around to ask, "Works too what, Kurozachs?"

Grinning to expose her fangs, Kladias replied, "Effectively shut everyone up - I was thinking of howling over them all." her dark red eyes briefly met Ichigo's before focusing back to Shinji's, "Let's get this thing started already."

A second's silence after, Shinji whipped his head back and began turning around on the spot, waving his hand up and down at shinigamis still stumbling up, "Get up, get up! Come on - it can't have been that bad. We're starting _now_, we're playing by _my_ rules, and you're _not_ going to complain about it, end of discussion."

Ichigo opened his mouth to protest, but caught Shinji giving him a warning glare and closed it back at the last second. _Fine, let's get started, your way._

* * *

><p>"How did you do that?" Ichigo exclaimed, utterly amazed. Rukia bounded towards him, face beaming, her violet eyes shining with excitement.<p>

She came to a stop in front of him, clenched her white tekkou*-clad hands in front of her and positively squee-ed, "Nii-sama coached me! Isn't this just wonderful?" she unclenched her hands and put them over her heart, "He'd be so proud!" She looked as if she'd float away and disappear into the bright clouds above any second now.

_Ah, so Byakuya's been acting like a proper brother like he should've from the start, _Ichigo thought slightly bitterly, but lessened his customary scowl as Rukia continued to think outloud her ultimate bliss.

Their group of twelve had gone through two rounds of tag and Rukia had been the last one left standing _both times_. Shunpo was the key element to winning the game; Ichigo had been 'it' the first time and had thought that he could _dominate _the game no problem, but soon it was apparent to him that there were more to the seated officers of Gotei 13 than he had previously thought. Nevertheless, he managed to tag people over to his side without much problem, but no one, _no one _seemed to be able to come up with a working plan to catch the small, flitting blur that was Rukia.

Shinji saw the state Rukia was in and walked over grinning, "Hey, Kuchiki-san, congratulations, but calm down before one of them throws a fit."

Ichigo looked up to find the group gathered around the three of them. Half of them, such as Rangiku, Hinamori and Isane, looked genuinely happy for Rukia, but some others such as Tetsuzaemon and Yumichika had blank but disgruntled looks their faces. In Ikkaku's case, he had a vein visibly pulsing on his forehead. _Guess they didn't like losing,_ Ichigo thought. He himself didn't like losing either, but he found himself feeling glad for her.

Further out, Ichigo saw Kira and Hisagi emerged in a quiet conversation. Kladias stood slightly apart from the two of them, seeming to be staring off to the side at nothing in particular. Curious, he followed her gaze far off to a patch of black with a red dot on the edge _- ah, there was Renji, still splayed on the grass._

"Alright, let's go onto the next activity now," Shinji shouted out, pulling Ichigo's eyes away from the hungover vice-captain, "hide-and-seek sounds like fun," _Nope, _Ichigo groaned along with what sounded like the entire group,

Shinji raised his hand in front of him defensively, on his face a mock terror, "No? Then- what is it, Nanao-chan?"

After grimacing and adjusting her glasses with a thumb and forefinger, Nanao pointed out, "We're running low on time, Captain Hirako. I propose that we move onto the actual combat session."

A cheer from the crowd.

A scoff, and Shinji announced, "All right, all right, blood and gore it is then," Ichigo spotted Ikkaku and Tetsuzaemon whooping in glee. Shinji continued, seeming to be looking around for someone, "please get over here and prepare the drawing box, vice-captain Kotetsu."

_Random draw fighting?_ Ichigo wasn't sure if he liked the sound of that...

* * *

><p>Ten minutes later, Ichigo sprang up from the grass, arms feeling as if they've been broken in a million pieces. He scowled deeper than ever. Also, he was pretty sure he was about to instantaneously combust from everything he was feeling at the moment: humiliation, frustration, annoyance, irritation, <em>more humiliation-<em>

To his traumatizing disbelief, he had lost the first combat match. In front of everyone. _To a vice-captain._

He walked up to Zangetsu, which was stuck halfway into the grass with its hilt up in the air, and gave it an impulsive kick on the opposite side of the blade. He let out a "Ahh!" when it fell over without putting up a fight. He snatched it up to gingerly heave it onto its place on his back, turned around then glared death at and pointed an accusing finger to the character who had been his opponent, "That was freaking _cheap,_ Kira!"

_At least the blond vice-captain seemed to be on the verge of fainting._ The said shinigami blinked and calmly inquired, "How so?"

"First of all, if that ability of your zanpakuto's isn't cheap, _I don't know what the hell is! _What'd it do, anyway?"

Kira raised an eyebrow ever so slightly, "Wabisuke's ability is his ability, unique all to his own, and I'd rather you not call him cheap, Kurosaki-san. What he actually does is doubling the weight of whatever he strikes; for example, at the first strike, double the weight. However, the at the second, double _that _so quadruple the initial amount. Likewise, the third- "

Ichigo interrupted, even more pissed, "Yeah yeah, I get it now. It's still cheap - not like Zangetsu's featherweight to begin with!" _Damn sure that ability'd better be unique._

"That still does not cover for your lack of defense when it comes to kido." _Ouch. Struck a nerve. _"Please calm down, Kurosaki-san. It had been an honor to engage in combat with you." _Was the last part a required formal greeting of sort that's supposed to make everything rainbows and honey?_ Ichigo thought. _Well, it didn't for him._

The blond vice-captain stumbled before shunpo-ing past him, towards where Ichigo knew the group of shinigamis were standing around waiting. He ground his teeth hard and turned around to head there himself. As he recalled the fight, he felt like he'd blow up...

_The whistle sounded. Ichigo tensed his grip on Zangetsu and looked across to the shinigami standing fifty feet away from him, realizing that he had absolutely no idea what his opponent's abilities were._

_He saw the shinigami casually lift his zanpakuto to his side, "Raise your head, Wabisuke." Ichigo barely heard him speak out in a solemn voice the command and the name of the zanpakuto._

_Someone in the crowd hooted._

_Both Ichigo's eyes and mouth flew wide open as he watched the zanpakuto distort its shape to some sort of a squared hook, "The hell's that? You're going shikai already?"_

_"It would be to my disadvantage if the fight draws out, so yes." with that, Kira lunged towards him in one sleek move, head raised and zanpakuto flat to his side as if to avoid wind resistance._

_And the next thing Ichigo knew, he was fending off a blow after blow. Not that he had a problem blocking them - he was able to predict every single move and place Zangetsu there split seconds before the blade struck. In fact, after three clashes, Ichigo found an opening and moved to strike-_

_Kira suddenly disappeared from his sight, and a second later, Ichigo spotted him back where he started, his zanpakuto raised halfway up at his side. Icy blue eyes flashed. Not wanting to waste time, Ichigo took a step forward to prepare for a shunpo-_

_"AHH!" he let out a pained yelp as he felt his arms nearly get ripped out of their sockets. Another yelp as he found Zangetsu sliced down onto the grass exactly where he was about to step to. He pulled at Zangetsu with a grunt, and to his horror, he couldn't lift it an inch. In fact, he felt - and saw - it sink down a foot deeper._

_He saw at the top of his vision the vice-captain lunging towards him again-_

_"Dammit!" he let go of his half-buried zanpakuto and jumped few feet back, hands raised in front of him and getting his body to a fighting stance. Fine then - he couldn't use his sword, but he bet he could still kick ass with hand-to-hand combat-_

_Then he saw Kira revert his zanpakuto back to its sealed form with a flick of a wrist, lips starting to move. Ichigo inwardly groaned-_

_Oh HELL. NO._

_"Kyokkou," a whisper, and the vice-captain disappeared from his sight, along with his entire presence. Puzzled, Ichigo whipped his head around in search of him-_

_Kira's voice rang somewhere from his right, "Bakudou Number 4, Hainawa,"_

_A loud, crackling yellow rope sprang out to Ichigo from nowhere, and less than an eyeblink later he found his arms pinned to his side by them, unable to move. But almost immediately, he felt the ropes loosen and hastily struggled-_

_"Bakudou Number 63, Sajou Sabaku," this time from his left. Yet another rope of yellow, almost identical to the one before but with less of a crackle and more thickness, sprang at Ichigo before he could get out of the way, pinning his almost-freed arms back to his side with crushing force a hundredfold stronger than before._

_Ichigo let out a frustrated growl as he pushed his arms against them. The ropes only kept tightening. He tried to shunpo out of them - no result._

_"Ye lord! Mask of blood and flesh," he heard Kira start right in front of him._

_He scrunched eyes up in annoyance and struggled with urgency, groaning as the ropes tightened ever more - he knew next to nothing about kido, but even he knew that that was start of an incantation, which would strengthen whatever the spell._

_It was GOD DAMN humiliating that he was stuck helpless against a couple of fancy lights! So many people watching - what's going to happen to his reputation when this got out?_

_"all creation, flutter of wings, ye who bears the name of Man!-"_

_He was quite resigned that he was stuck stationary - only way left to move was down(fall splat on the grass), but he figured that he'd be no better there. So, since he was stuck - that kido Kira was working up right now then must be an attack kido-_

_"On the wall of blue flame, inscribe a twin lotus-"_

_AHHH! What in the world was this rope-thing made of? Reiatsu, fine, he knew that. A rhetorical question. Of desperation. Of DESPERATE desperation._

_"In the abyss of conflagration-"_

_Can he, like, die right here, RIGHT NOW so he can avoid the utter embarrassment?_

_"wait at the far heavens!"_

_Shit, shit shit shit shit shit shit was that the end of it-_

_"Hadou Number 73, Souren Soukatsui!"_

_Nope, but __**FUCK**__!_

_As he saw the start of the kido's bright blue spark, he began to throw himself to the side in attempt to avoid the hit. Which proved futile - almost instantly, his vision filling up with blinding blue light, he was struck square on the chest with a tremendous force that sent him hurtling straight back, breath completely knocked out of him and wind whooshing past his ears._

_He crashed onto the grass, back-first, feeling rope-kido that had been imprisoning him shatter and fling his arms away from him. The Soukatsui thing seemed to have bulls-eyed the rope-kido, conveniently breaking it up for him. But his arms felt like flimsy, fleshy extension of his shoulders, and he couldn't see a thing. The light from the last spell appeared to have rendered him completely blind for the moment._

_Something(a foot?) drove itself under his right arm from the side and kicked him over. Regaining some control of his arms, Ichigo slammed down his right palm to the ground beside him before his body fully landed to get himself up-_

_Kira was going to pay for this crap, damn he'll make sure of that-_

_But before he could do so, he felt a foot(definitely, this time,) drive a crushing blow smackdown between his shoulder blades, breath knocked out of him for the second time-_

_His upper body dropped down onto the grass, and Ichigo first sensed his neck land across what could've been less than a hair's width away from an upturned, awaiting blade. Next he sensed was the two of the same sword's blades on either side of his neck._

_Confusion - same one on three sides? What the hell-_

_Oh. The weird squared hook shape Kira's shikai took._

_So literally, he had a reverse guillotine around his neck. Ichigo knew with a grind of his teeth that in an actual combat situation, he wouldn't even have had the time to figure that out - his head would have been lopped off the split second the wielder had the chance. In this situation, few seconds had already passed by._

_The world returned. A blade of grass wavered right in front of his eyes, details in an astonishing clear focus. He wondered if he'd gone deaf, or it was the world that was silent._

_A whistle cut through the still air, announcing the combat's end._

Yup, Ichigo was feeling screwed in every single possible way he could ever be. He continued walking, and caught Rukia staring at him, her eyes wide with mixed emotions. He averted his gaze, though he quickened his pace.

It then occured to him with a stab in the heart, that from the combat's start to end, he couldn't feel a single thing coming from Zangetsu.

* * *

><p><strong>Ah, I might owe you some explanations -<strong>

***tekkou : the white glove-thing Rukia showed up with recently. **

**And just in case you're wondering where I'm going with all of this - so far, nothing's been happening in random.  
><strong>


	10. The Distance, the Giggle

**A/N: Today's the day before school reopens for the semester. Lapse between the next updates will largely depend on how ferocious the pile of homework I'm sure to get is.**

* * *

><p>As Ichigo approached the crowd, Kira was in the process of receiving hearty slaps and fists on his shoulder. He still seemed to be in his faint-or-not-to-faint stage, but looked quite pleased with himself.<p>

_Whereas Ichigo's scowl was about to crack his forehead in two._

Among the praises, compliments and plain old bickering comments going on, he heard Hinamori's horrified squeak, "Are you out of your mind, Kira-kun? Sajou Sabaku without an incantation and Souren Soukatsui _with one, _worst case scenario, could easily have drained you of your reiatsu completely! Kido spells in its 60s and 70s!"

She jabbered on and he saw Kira trying to meekly retort, only to be drowned by her frantic ramblings. Fifty feet away from the crowd, Rukia shunpo-ed close and planted herself in front of Ichigo, disbelief apparent on her face, hands in fists,

"Ichigo! You should have been able to break free from Kira-san's Sajou Sabaku - even though it was a level 63 kido that no physical strength alone could ever overcome-"

"Then that's why - I suck at kido!" Ichigo snapped, not up for a lecture.

"Just hear me out!" Rukia snapped back, her aura slightly darkening, "_If it is executed properly,_ Ichigo. From what I could tell, Kira-san has not yet reached a level where he could skip the incantation of a level 63 kido and still call forth anywhere near the full power-"

"So what? He-" Ichigo interrupted but before he could let his mouth run free, Rukia stuck her index finger in front of his face, action demanding silence. Hardness in her eyes reminding him of her stoic older brother.

He growled through clenched teeth, "Fine, Rukia." _What you have to say'd better be important._

At Ichigo's resignation, Rukia's eyes softened though her finger stayed where it was. Voice reasoning, she stated, "Vice-captain Kira did have a good plan to use your weaknesses to his advantage. He released his zanpakuto right at the beginning, eliminated Zangetsu from the fight with it and then turned to kido, which he knew that you were not so familiar with nor strong at.

"Kyokkou to hide his presence, Hainawa, a low-level bind to make you hesitate enough to be caught in Sajou Sabaku, a high-level bind to fully restrain you. And your stunning performance against _that,_" the finger in front of Ichigo now pointed _at_ him that he had to jerk his head back in order to avoid getting poked in the nose, "is what I can't figure out."

Thoroughly irritated, Ichigo batted the finger away from his face, "You expect me to know? I couldn't get it off of me, end of the story!"

Nursing her hand and looking just as irritated, Rukia shot out, "The fights in the past, you have overcome far worse!" her eyes widened, voice gaining volume,"You bested a number of vice-captains and captains! The Arrancars! Aizen! And less than a month ago, Ginjou! I was there, remember?"

Sudden silence. Rukia closed her mouth, eyes blinking rapidly at him as if she was shocked by her outburst.

Ichigo was in a state of shock himself _- why was she getting so worked up? It was just a practice combat..._

He stared down into her deep violet eyes, to see if he could find the reason there.

She immediately looked away, turning her head to the crowd still gathered around Kira as if to check if anyone was watching. She turned her head back to meet his gaze again, and Ichigo saw in them... _concern?_

Her eyes dropped down and when she spoke, it was quiet, like a confession,

"I have had trouble sensing your reiatsu, Ichigo. And from time to time, it's like you just completely disappear."

Ichigo's eyebrows shot up, but he kept his mouth closed. He had a feeling that Rukia had more to say. And she did,

"The morning you came back to Seireitei. Captain Ukitake had been unwell and I had spent all day in his office doing paperwork. During that time I felt your reiatsu enter the atmosphere, soon joined by Hisagi-san. Some time after that, it began to flicker."

Ichigo grimaced, _so she had been stalking him the first day? What about after that? _but he instead he asked "What began to flicker, Rukia?"

She flashed him an annoyed look, "Reiatsu, your reiatsu, fool! It was as if something was interfering with the signal. What happened after? I have been meaning to ask sooner."

Ichigo tilted his head, a hand rubbing the back of his neck as he thought outloud, "Exit senkaimon, two hours with Hisagi-san answering useless questionnaires. Then to the training barrack just in time to see someone get thrown out the door over to the forest." Rukia's eye gave a twitch,

"Hisagi-san got me to meet Kladias, showed me to my office and then-"

"Hold on a second!" Rukia interrupted. She was blinking rapidly, and her brain seemed to be at work, judging by how she was staring into a blank space.

He thought he heard Rukia mutter Kladias's name under her breath and opened his mouth-

"What happened yesterday?" Rukia had jerked her head up to him, traces of paranoia in her eyes.

"What?" Ichigo blurted instead of what he had been meaning to say, thrown off by the random question.

She repeated, frantic, "Yesterday. What happened yesterday?"

Ichigo got himself back on track, "Never mind that - what were you going on about Kladias?"

"Yesterday! Were you with her?" _The hell was she getting to?_

_"No! _I wasn't anywhere near Kladias for almost the entire day! Now what-"

"Are you sure?"

_"NO - _I mean, _YES,_ _damn I'm sure!_ Now tell me-"

Before he could finish, Rukia stuck her right hand in front of him with a flash of light, and his next words fell silent. He stared wide-eyed at Rukia, incredulous, his mouth still opening and closing with no audible words coming out. _Kido again? _He felt the anger inside boiling up-

He then saw her looking over to the crowd again. He followed her gaze to Kladias. _For real?_

The said colonel had her back to them, beside a laughing Rangiku. Beyond them stood the rest of the group; Hinamori(horrified), Isane(suppressing a giggle), Nanao(agitated), Ikkaku, Tetsuzaemon(both cackling), Yumichika(simply amused), Hisagi(looking _absolutely _pissed) and Kira(pale and leaning onto Hisagi for support but laughing his head off nevertheless). Shinji was attempting to shout something over all of them.

Rukia whipped her head back to Ichigo with urgency, troubled look on her face, her jaw clenched and her deep dark violet eyes icy and solid.

She slowly lowered her hand from his face and when she finally spoke, there was a strange ring to her voice that chilled Ichigo to the bone-

"Keep your distance from her, Ichigo."

...

_What?_

"What?" stunned, he just let out the one word in his mind.

"Stay away from her! No, wait, _physically,_ don't, just be beside her as her second-in-command should, but-"

Ichigo regained the proper use of his brain and tongue, "The hell you mean stay away from her? Why? What's she done?"

Rukia let out a groan, "Just do it! I'll explain later in private. _Please, _Ichigo?"

"Why can't you tell me now?" Ichigo raised his voice,

"Just stay. Away. From. Her. _PLEASE!_" Rukia's voice rose along, past his to a near-hysterical screech - _what was so serious that she had to screech and plead?_

At that moment, if anyone analyzed that Ichigo was frustrated, he would've given them a life's worth of beating for being too stupid to find more of an intense, concentrated word. He _detested_ being told straight up what to do with no reason, but pulling off a it's-confidential-I'll-tell-you-later? Made it far, _far. Worse._

He roared, "I'm _NOT_ going to stay the hell away from her just because you tell me to! What's wrong, Rukia?"

Rukia, definitely hysterical now, all of a sudden let out a high-pitched squeak and clamped both her hands onto her mouth. Her eyes, impossibly wide and her pupils tiny dots, appeared to be focused at some point over Ichigo's left shoulder.

Rush of adrenaline, and Ichigo spun himself around, a hand going straight for the hilt of his zanpakuto-

"WHOA - Ichigo! Rukia! Relax! It's just good old me, Renji!" The redhead stood three feet in front of him with his hands raised to above his head in a sign of surrender, in his face a complete shock. He still looked a bit pale, but he seemed to have regained complete sense of balance.

Adrenaline draining out of him, Ichigo did relax, lowering his hand and grimacing. Behind him, he felt Rukia physically deflate, her breath coming out in shudders followed by rushed-up, incoherent babbles of what vaguely sounded like apologies. In a rather mischievous impulse, with two strides Ichigo stepped up to side of still-shocked Renji and turned around to face Rukia, crossing his arms in front of his chest. He saw her babbling on, her hands flying all over the place - clenched in front of her one second, on her head the next, one on her lip and the other on her stomach the next, so on - for no apparent reason.

...it looked kind of funny. _Ridiculous, actually._

Suppressing his mirth, Ichigo deadpanned, turned his head sideways to face Renji and asked, "How much did you hear?"

A wide, knowing smile split the vice-captain's face in two, "From the 'Just stay away from her' part."

_Uh-oh. _Something about that told bad news.

Renji continued, smile widening, "So, what, you've already found yourself a girlfriend in this place?" he looked pointedly at Rukia, "I think she's gone off her rockets in jealousy or something similar."

That shut Rukia up, flying hands and all. Both Ichigo and she gawked at Renji in utter disbelief. In unison, the two whipped their head around to Kladias, who just _had_ to turn to look at them a split second later_, _wearing her huge customary smile. She caught the trio of them staring and quirked up an she gave a casual shrug, smile a grin now, swung her arm up her side in an arc - _a wave?_ - and turned back to Rangiku.

_Fucking screw the timing! _Ichigo swore,_ NO WAY Renji missed that._

Feeling sure he was right, Ichigo turned back to face Renji, just in time to catch the redhead's face set in an impressive mixture of shock, amusement, disbelief, _horror _and what else, Ichigo didn't wait to figure out-

"Yo - _shit! _It's not what you think, Renji!"

_Out comes his mouth one of the most trite, cliche sentence that so very obviously hinted the speaker's guilt. _Ichigo was never even watching the commercials of those soap operas Yuzu loved again. _Ever._

He felt a blush creeping up his neck as he watched Renji fight to keep a straight face and swore loudly when the redhead failed instantly, ducking and starting to double up with arms around his abdomen, whine of a laugh bubbling out of his mouth-

_WHAM! _Ichigo drove a knee at Renji right below the ribs, forcefully straightening the laughing idiot up before dropping him straight backwards onto the grass howling in what probably was both pain and laughter.

Rukia didn't let Ichigo down - blushing furiously too, she delivered a powerful kick to the side of the splayed form, flipping it over and drawing out a fresh round of howls.

Ichigo's foot moved in preparation to deliver the next kick when Shinji's voice rang out,

"Rukia-san! Ichigo! Get over h- _what are you two doing to vice-captain Abarai?"_

Ichigo yelled over in reply, "Driving some sense into him!" But he set down his foot and turned around to face Shinji and the rest of the group with an innocent grin on his face. They all were displaying varying degrees of surprise.

Renji, who was lying face-up now, had stopped howling, and was _giggling_ in effort to keep quiet instead, Ichigo and Rukia's audio horror. Ichigo had the urge to lift his foot again and drive it into the idiot's face.

Rukia straightened, turned to face the same way as Ichigo, opened her mouth and closed it again with a "Hmph!". She flicked Ichigo an accusatory glare.

Shinji, who had his eyebrows slightly raised, let out a "Che," and commented,

"He's still alive? That's good, I thought you two were over your head putting him out of his hungover misery."

Ichigo let out a snort.

The captain continued, "Get all of your asses over here, pick him up and carry him over if you have to - next combat's gotta start."

Feeling strangely docile, Ichigo bent over to grab Renji by an arm, Rukia grab the other. The two started towards the group, trailing the limp, now-silent form on the ground between them.

Entire lower body dragging on the grass, Renji drawled, "So you're _not _getting it on with _THE_ most violent chick in Gotei 13?"

_Screw it, _Ichigo couldn't tell if he was being serious or not.

He snapped, "_NO_, _seriously._ I'm not. For real. Swear on both of my lives. Shut up now."

Renji let out another giggle.

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><p><strong>One scene, two happenings. Can a fic go any slower than that?<br>**

**The visuals from the last one-third wouldn't leave me alone, so I wanted to try to type it up in words. I personally think this chapter was... *looks* 827 words too long X_x**

**Bye 'till next time!  
><strong>


	11. The Malice, the Terror

**A/N: Dammit, it's been a almost a week, sorry about that. Not much schoolwork yet, but going to school everyday itself's driving me restless enough not to be able to sit down and write.** **That's it for my whining(for now), go on.**

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><p>Just Ichigo and Rukia abandoned the limp form of Renji three foot away from the crowd, Shinji announced the next pair of combatants. A good portion of the group cringed as Ikkaku and Tetsuzaemon let out a unison of deafening warcries. With wolfish grins on their faces, they zipped towards the center of the field all while shouting what sounded like threats, insults and obnoxious bickering to work each other up.<p>

Ichigo thought he caught the pair of them complaining about lack of sake, but he could have been wrong.

At reaching the designated area, the two over-excited shinigami stood forehead-to-forehead, visibly snarling at each other as a pair of canines starving for blood would. Ichigo blinked. _Here he was thinking he had been feeling competitive._

The pair spun around with an audible crisp rustle of fabric and strutted away to the individual starting points 50 feet apart.

Shinji reached for the whistle around his neck and yelled, "Alright, you two- _HEY, I didn't blow whistle ye- _oh, what's the point." he ended with a sigh and flicked the whistle away as the two sprang at each other without waiting, yelling their heads off.

_It was unbelievable how they could try to kill each other off and keep the streams of insults going at the same time, _Ichigo thought.

The captain beside him flopped backwards onto the grass into a crouching position, knees drawn halfway, an elbow resting on each side and arms draped down the length of his legs. Pair of golden-brown eyes warily regarded the pair of combatants.

Ichigo set down Zangetsu behind him and dropped down too, cross-legged. He saw the other shinigamis move to settle down too in a line facing the combatants. _Except for Renji, who seemed to have fallen immobile on the exact spot where Rukia and he left him to rot._

_Speaking of Rukia..._ he spotted her far to the other side of Shinji, feet tucked beneath her in a kneeling position. Nanao and Isane sat to her right, Rangiku and Hinamori to her left. Rangiku, always the over-exuberant spirit, had already got her mouth's engine running well over speed limit, excitedly jabbering away at her four audibly-overpowered companions.

Left to the girls and directly next to Shinji was Yumichika, knees also drawn up halfway to rest his elbows on. His zanpakuto was balanced on the ground with the tip of the scabbard set down, fingers of his right hand loosely circling the middle of the scabbard to keep it upright. Narrowed wisteria eyes darted left and right as they followed the movements of the fight.

_CLACK! Tetsuzaemon fended off a crossed scabbard-and-blade from Ikkaku..._

Right to Ichigo sat Kladias, cross-legged, elbows on her knees. Her chin rested on the back of her right hand while the left arm hung limp in front of her, hand aimlessly tracing circles in the grass. Her dark crimson eyes were bright as she stared unblinkingly at the ongoing combat.

Next to her, Hisagi was leaned back on both elbows, one leg straight in front of him and the other bent up halfway, knee pointing up. Along with a frown, there was a slight bored look on his face. Kira sat next to him, hugging and resting his chin on one knee, the other leg straight.

_Tetsuzaemon's yelling drove to the extreme end of profanity as Ikkaku's swing missed his sunglasses by a hair's width._

* * *

><p>Ten minutes into the fight, dead silence among the spectators struck Ichigo strange. He cocked his head towards to Kladias and commented,<p>

"No cheering - poor sportsmanship much?"

Still staring straight ahead but a smirk forming on her face, she stated, "When two bloodhounds are trying to rip each others' throats off, leave them alone. Some learn it the hard way, you just got a special treat."

Ichigo let out a quiet "Hmph" in response. _Continue the silence, fine by him._

But apparently, Kladias had other ideas-

"So you and kido, not friends?"

_Oh PLEASE let her not start at him about that-_

"What'd you think? _No. _Shut up." Ichigo snapped, annoyance perking up, desperately hoping that he wasn't blushing.

Kladias let out a bark of laughter and teased, "Ouch, touchy. Just saying, someone won't be teaching kido once the training division starts up."

His frown deepening, Ichigo was digging around for an acceptable comeback when someone beat him to it. _Sort of._

"Look who's talking, Kurozachs."

Kladias snapped her head towards the speaker, "And who's that, Hisagi?"

The vice-captain had a smug look on his face, "A shinigami who went through a course of preliminary kido and failed _every. single. practical _on the exam." Ichigo saw Kira lean forward to peer from across.

Kladias's voice rose in pitch, "A _course?_ It was a lousy hit-and-run load of crap!"

Hisagi didn't miss a beat, "Just because you couldn't handle the material, doesn't mean that it was _crap, _as you call it."

A snarl, "I handled it fine-"

Kira cut in, "By breaking the examiner's tibia-"

"That's shin bone in plain language-" Hisagi whispered at Ichigo-

"-cleanly in two?" Kira finished, displaying a sheepish grin with a hint of mischief on his face.

Kladias snapped, "That ancient drag deserved it! He and his philosophy should've DIED _centuries_ ago. Besides, it was him, so-called _the_ kido-genius, who was too sloppy to magic up a defense."

Hisagi shot back, smirking, "Be _extremely _grateful that the rest of the examiners had the decency to see it as a potential; had they not, you'd be-"

_Something moved-_

_Bzzz- CRACK!_

A flash of intense neon-blue light issued with the sound and rendered Ichigo blind for the _second time in less than half an hour,_ he realized with annoyance. Moments later when the black dots disappeared from his vision, he glared at the scene in front of him. Then he raised an eyebrow.

It appeared that Kladias had attempted to dedicate another set of scars to Hisagi's face; her tense body halfway turned, left arm outstretched towards him, bone standing out from the back of her hand and fingers curved to a classic set of cat-claws. Hisagi seemed to have managed to fend her off somehow, though; a foot away from his face, the back of his clenched fist kept Kladias's claws hovering less than an inch away.

"Bakudou Number 8, Seki," small smirk, "that elementary reiatsu manipulation of yours is _not _going to cut it against me, Kurozachs." he stated loud and clear as he lowered his fist, giving his head a slight tilt as he stared down at the snarling subordinate.

Kira mused in his two cents, "Don't strain that arm, Kladias-san. It was supposed to send you flying far off, in case you weren't aware-"

_Same crackling sound, same flash of light-_

Ichigo heard Hisagi let out a pained yelp and clamber up to his feet - couldn't know for sure, since he was _blinded once again for the love of freaking puppies and daffodils. _Thoroughly irritated and still blind, he sprang up and roared out,

"The HELL did you do, Kladias?"

The culprit drawled, "Calm down, sport - I just put an end to an unfinished business." from where the sound was coming, she too seemed to have gotten to her feet already.

When Ichigo's vision returned a second later, he saw Hisagi doubled over, clenching the left of his face with both hands. Kira seemed to be in a state of panic, hysterical voice shooting a question after question of well-being at his fellow vice-captain.

Hisagi straightened up and roared at Kladias, hands still clutching his face,

"_What_ is with you and my tattoo today-"

Kladias speedily interrupted, "That was for Kensei-"

_"Captain Muruguma _to you-"

"His god _DAMN _majesty - that should cover for a while - for yelling the eardrums out of my head this morning!

"That will _not_ cover, and why am _I _taking the heat for my Captain's doing? Not to mention that he certainly did have the right-"

"The _hell_ he does!"

"_WHAT? _Who do you think you - ugh, never mind that. You are unleashing your anger on the wrong pers-"

Seeming to be playing deaf, Kladias whipped up her arm to point at the spot Hisagi was still clutching, "You copy the shit off of the asshole's chest onto your freaking _face _and forget about it, fanboy? Gotta give it to the genius who got the entire Central 46 drunk enough to put you in charge of anyth-"

_Uh-oh. Ichigo felt Hisagi's aura shift-_

Hisagi ripped his hands off of his reddened cheek and spat out, _"Watch your mouth, Officer Kuro-"_

_Heavy flash of reiatsu,_

**"**_**SHUT THE FUCK UP! BOTH OF YOU!"**_

_Silence._

_..._

_Ichigo heard a sound of fist on flesh in the distance. Tetsuzaemon let out a roar that would've made a lion shrivel up._

He twisted around and looked down to Shinji, who had been the one to snap and bellow out. He spotted the captain still crouched on the ground, glowering up at Hisagi and Kladias. Yumichika and the five girls stared frozen still, wide-eyed, since when, he didn't know. He turned his head back to-

_The hell? _He found himself on the side of an overpowering staring match.

It was evident by Hisagi's face and body language that the usually self-composed vice-captain was on verge of _completely _losing his head: coal eyes shining with malice; an uncharacteristic snarl turning up a lip to reveal a set of clenched teeth; entire body impossibly taut with hands clenched to fists at his sides; aura around him demanding justice by _death._

Kladias was in more or less a similar state: dark crimson eyes unusually bright as if calling for blood they were the color of; huge, predatory full-teeth snarl might as well been a grin except that it was drained of all its humor and amusement; hands still in her pockets but upper body straightened up from her usual slouch, neck muscles strained; wordlessly screaming her signature _bring-it-on-jackass _attitude with the volume turned up sky high.

_Snap of a string and someone was going to DIE._

Ichigo felt and saw a couple thumps of Shinji's reiatsu slam the pair of them down, buckling knees and breaking eye contact. Wide-eyed astonishment flashed across the their faces as they were struck out of bloodlust, turning around to the captain. There was a look of agitated embarrassment on Hisagi's face, a pissed-off snarl on Kladias's.

Shinji, now standing, growled, "Seriously, kiddies, _cut it out_. You two might as well be a married couple."

Eyes and mouth widening in an emotion along the line of horror, Hisagi started to garble up a protest but Kladias spat out faster-

"Not a chance, Shinji - I would've divorced him already."

Hisagi let out an exasperated groan, turned back to her and was about shout when a twin blast of concentrated reiatsu whooshed through the entire group, blowing hairs back and rendering everyone silent.

The reiatsu had come from the shikai releases of the two combatants; Ikkaku was now twirling around his spear/sansetsukon with a maniac grin on his face, Tetsuzaemon roaring out a laughter, swinging a huge falchion-like zanpakuto.

_They didn't seem to give a damn if anyone was watching or not._

"See? Even the two out there are telling the pair of you to shut up. _So do._" Shinji caught Kladias opening her mouth, _"NOW! _You were out of line, Kladias, and that's saying something. _You,_" he pointed a finger at the fuming woman then jerked a thumb over his shoulder with the same hand, "next to the girls, end of the line-up. And _stay there-_"

Kladias yelped, "The hell I'm being ordered to a time-out!"

Shinji's voice hardened,_ "You are._ Last chance before-"

"YO! We're done!" Ikkaku's yell cut him off from afar. Tetsuzaemon and he were now walking towards the group side-by-side, zanpakutos lowered to their sides still in shikai forms. Ichigo spotted swellings and some blood on both of them but no serious injuries, which came to him as a surprise as the fight seemed - and sounded - raucous to the extreme.

Ichigo got the glance of rest of the shinigamis getting to their feet then hollered at Ikkaku, "Who won? You two went shikai ten seconds ago!"

"Shut it!" Ikkaku snapped, apparently annoyed. From a small smirk that appeared on Tetsuzaemon's face, Ichigo supposed that the pair of them had an agreement beforehand or something of similar.

"No winner? That's fine," Shinji snapped his fingers once, drawing everyone's attention, and continued, "why don't we kick out one of _them_ to the fieldnow,_" _- a brief glare at Hisagi and Kladias - "I'm sure we could all use a peace of mind."

Ichigo suggested, "Why not send out both?" _Now, that fight'll be interesting to watch..._

Shinji retorted warily, "And have a twin case of murder at my hand? _No_."

_Still, it'll be fun to watch..._ Nevertheless, Ichigo let go of it.

The captain turned to Isane, "Please prepare two boxes and draw one from each this time, Isane-san; the vice-captain and the 3rd seat of the 9th division in one, the rest who haven't gone in the other."

Her response was immediate, "Yes, sir!"

The tall woman walked up to the front of the group. She raised her hands chest-high, palms facing down. Shortly after, a small transparent box appeared below them each, numerous strands of light swirling inside the left box, only two inside the right one.

Looking to the box at the right, she spoke in a professional voice, "One of the next combatants-"

_The box pulsed with a soft glow then vanished, a single strand of light left in its place. The light then distorted its shape: a flower insignia with three horizontal lines beneath._

"White poppy, three - 3rd seat officer Kurozachs Kladias, of the 9th division." she interpreted.

Isane started again, at the other box this time, "The officer going against her-"

The box went through the same process, resulting to a different flower insignia with two horizontal lines below.

"Snowdrop, two - vice-captain Kuchiki Rukia, of the 13th division." she finished.

The earlier freak-out about Kladias flashed through Ichigo's mind - his head snapped towards Rukia just in time to catch an unusual mixture of emotions slip beneath mask of a shy smile. She let out her good-natured chuckle for everyone to hear, a hand rubbing the back of her neck.

Shocked, Ichigo gave her a wide-eyed look of _what-the-HELL _which she ignored, bending down to pick up her zanpakuto and turning away to sprint towards the combat area.

"Hey - hurry the hell up, Rukia! Let's have some fun!" Kladias waved and hollered from farther out, having gotten a head start. Ichigo caught a note of excitement in her voice and glimpse of her pearly whites; the lethal Tasmanian Devil from few moments before had been replaced by her usual brash self.

Shinigamis around him tossed a comment or two at Ikkaku and Tetsuzaemon before falling silent. No one else seemed to have noticed the quirk with Rukia.

Feeling slightly dizzy and frowning, Ichigo dropped down onto the grass before anyone else, assuring himself that he was being paranoid to be feeling uneasy. _It's just a practice combat!_

_But then..._

One of the emotions he recognized on Rukia's face was something he had never seen before on her: pure malice. It was the intention to kill, determination to tear limbs apart, to destroy. _There was a possibility that Kladias wasn't getting out of the fight alive._

But the prominent emotion hadn't been malice. It was fear. Sheer, absolute, unreasonable terror that froze the core of his heart just by looking at it.

_Rukia was terrified of Kladias. Why?_

_...  
><em>

Shinji's whistle let out a shrill screech, signaling the combat's start.

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><p><strong>See ya later!<strong>


	12. The Ice, the Claws

**A/N: Hey! It's been a week, that's the speed that works out for me now. Apparently the site login was down for** **a day or something, but I polished up the chapter just today, so... no delay detected. Here it is!**

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><p>Reflex snapped Ichigo's arms up as a chunk of ice size of a small car hurtled towards him, even though he knew through and through that the action was pointless. Three feet from flattening him to an unrecognizable, bloody pulp, the mini-comet smashed into the invisible force field wall, shattered to a million tiny pieces and disappeared into thin air.<p>

He flinched again a smaller chunk slammed into the same spot, cracking open haphazardly in two before shattering. He let out a frustrated groan.

Wide-eyed and grimacing, thoroughly annoyed at himself for failing to refrain from flinching _every single time_, he exclaimed at no one at particular,

_"You're letting then go on like this?_ This is _CRAZY!"_

He flinched again as the ground quaked. Ice showered down onto him, clattering against the roof of the protection field.

* * *

><p>At the beginning, the combat seemed to be in favor of Kladias. As soon as the whistle sounded, her face cracked open in two with her usual impossibly-wide grin. Zanpakuto in her right hand, she launched at Rukia, triggering a ferocious and fast-paced sparring match mix of hand-to-hand combat and swordwork. The two gradually rose up to hover about thirty feet above the ground, Rukia being driven farther and farther away from the spectators, frantically defending herself. Some fifteen minutes later the the two finally separated to a complete stop at the far edge of the field, the shorter figure of Rukia's was unsteady, shoulders heaving in attempt to catch her breath. The taller one of Kladias's stood absolutely still, unfazed. A word or two might have been exchanged.<p>

The tide turned when Rukia leaped away and put herself to an offensive, firing bright and rapid blasts after blasts of various power-packed kido ranging from bolts of lightening to balls of fire at Kladias. The two zipped through the air with shunpo, the latter gradually driven back all the way back to the starting point. She managed to dodge or deflect most of the oncoming attacks but took damage from the rest she hadn't been able to. The upper part of her right arm had been singed shiny red, bottom left quarter of her hakama burnt away. The exposed leg was scarred black and so was her face.

With a blinding flash that lit up the scene, Rukia's next kido caught Kladias dead-center of the stomach, sending her hurtling over the group of shinigamis and down all the way to the other edge of the circular field. She plunged into the dark forest and a single, loud crash came seconds later.

Ichigo had been watching the fight in complete silence, cross-legged on the ground with his hands clenched to fists on his knees, body rigid with a sense of impending doom he couldn't drive off for the life of him. _Of course_ he had expected Kladias to be aggressive in a fight, judging by her usual attitude and the fact the beast Kenpachi had actually had _fun _sparring the woman. That didn't stop him from being shocked, not to mention impressed, as the 3rd-seat officer rendered a_ vice-captain _helpless.

He was no less impressed by Rukia's retaliation; the times back when he had seen her use kido, her spells had been weaker and were fired with only one at a time with incantation to result a narrower range of impact. Her skills now seemed to be at a whole different level; her kido spells were executed consecutively without incantations, range wider, and overall radiating awe-striking energy.

Ichigo turned his head and followed Kladias with his eyes as she sailed above him and disappeared into the dark green depth far off. Fight seemed to be over, and seemed like neither of the combatants had been killed nor fatally injured. He let out a sigh of relief, feeling his body loosening up. _See? Worrying had been pointless._

Above the treetops he caught the sight of the Soukyoku hill, barren and desolate.

It then struck him that _no way_ had he been the only one yearning for power the past year and a half. From how the other shinigamis congratulated Kira, it was obvious that the vice-captain's abilities had come far. He saw himself how Rukia's skills had completely transformed.

_Actually, strictly speaking of her kido skills. Her swordwork was steamrollered by Kladias's. _Ichigo let himself a smirk.

He felt a rare, genuine smile creep onto his face as he rose to his feet, turning back to face Rukia. He spotted her hovering far above ground, finishing sheathing her zanpakuto. He noticed with a jolt that the black material of her shihakusho was slashed open at the right shoulder, a narrow dark stain trailing down. There were more slashes on other parts of the material, but no more signs of blood. Her face was stained red from numerous cuts and hits she took on her cheeks.

_Her face..._

_Violet eyes narrowed, eyebrows furrowed, forehead creased in concentration. Lips pursed to a straight line, chin hard-set._

_Arms tense, both hands still clutching the handle of her zanpakuto in... anticipation?_

All of a sudden Rukia's eyes widened. She whipped her zanpakuto out of its scabbard in one quick move, held it out in front of her with one hand,

_"Dance, Sode no Shirayuki-"_

A powerful ripple of reiatsu struck Ichigo from behind, lurching him forward. He yelped and steadied himself at the very last second, confused as to the direction the reiatsu came from-

A sharp thud shook the ground. His head snapped up see Rukia - _gone?_

_No - _he spotted her getting up to her feet right below where she had been hovering-

_BAM! _The entire field quaked. Dirt and grass exploded up from the exact spot Rukia was.

Ichigo lunged forward, only to be forced back again, cringing and snapping up his arms to shield his head as the debris showered down onto him. When he lowered them back, Rukia was nowhere to been seen near the small crater made by the explosion.

A thick pillar of brilliant white erupted towards the sky at the center of the field - one he right away recognized it as one of Rukia's shikai attacks. As he stared in mild surprise - also confusion, _where was the threat?_ - a black figure crashed out the side of it, 50 feet above ground. He recognized the figure too.

_Kladias?_

_His surprise wasn't so mild anymore. When'd she get out of the forest?_

Kladias hopped back away from the pillar, and white glow from the ice glinted off something in - _on?_ - her hands. She reset her footing, drew a fist back and lunged-

An ear-blasting cracking sound, and the entire of the column shattered apart. Pieces of ice spun down, disintegrating before they hit the ground. Ichigo jerked back slightly, frown back on his face; the stark brightness of the scene hurt his eyes.

Rukia appeared, landing from a shunpo, about thirty feet left to where her ice pillar used to stand, her snowy white zanpakuto held up to a defensive stance. Immediately, Kladias materialized three feet front of her, right hand drawn back, then went for a punch to the dead-center of Rukia's chest-

A piercing clang of metal-on-metal rang through the air.

Brief stillness - the flat side of Rukia's zanpakuto had blocked the tip of one of Kladias's blades.

_Ichigo now knew what Kenpachi had meant._

Five blades, slightly curved downwards to a razor-sharp point at the tip, squared off at the base, rested on top of the lines of bones of Kladias's hand. Her hand was curled to a fist but the blades extended over the knuckles, a second set of fingers outstretched towards her of them about an inch in height at the base, the blade at the middle the longest with 8 inches back to front, others shorter, varying in length just as fingers of a hand would be. A thick, inch wide gun-metal band encased her wrist, connected to and backing the bases of all five blades.

_Well, there it was, her shikai. Claws... _A smirk crept on Ichigo's lips as images of Wolverine came to his mind. _Who knew that a similar ability actually existed?_

But then, just how much didn't the people in human world know? _Just about nothing outside of their own world_. A pang of responsibility weighed his chest down-

He returned his attention to the combat.

Rukia and Kladias had continued on with their sparring match, shunpo-ing in and out of sight all over the air. Rukia was back on defensive, Kladias rapidly slashing away and throwing quintuple-bladed punches. Ichigo noticed that Kladias's other hand was equipped with the same set of blades and wristband.

A drawling voice startled him, "Sit back down, Ichigo."

Ichigo snapped his head down towards Shinji, who was now cross-legged on the grass, hunched over with elbows on his knees.

The captain, eyes darting to follow the combatants, continued, "Looks like the real show's just starting." Then he straightened up, clasped his fingers in front of him and gave his arms a stretch forward. He switched to a louder, sing-songy voice that addressed the entire crowd,

"Now, a fun challenge for all of you! Brand new shikai in front of us, give me an analysis. Go to town!"

Ichigo groaned and heard a mix of "Yes, sir!" and complains from the others. Of _course_ he was going to analyze her shikai, but hearing the exact order/request come out of his supposed superior's mouth just took the fun out of it.

He returned to observe the fight, nevertheless. _Reverse psychology wasn't going to drive him off of a good chance to practice ability-reading._

* * *

><p><em>Heading back to the present.<em>

_Ichigo hollered over the clatter of ice, "You heard me? Yo! _Shinji, I'm talking to you! Seriously_-"_

The group had moved to the far edge of the field after being almost flattened by Rukia's ice wave Hakuren. Everyone had remained standing while they continued watching. In silence. Except for a few.

"Shaddup!" Shinji snapped. The clatters stopped, bringing silence. "You were _yelling_ at me so I did hear you. Both of them are doing fine, so stop quaking in your boots and get a grip."

_The last words, along with the freaky, amused grin, pissed Ichigo off._

"I'm NOT quaking in my boots! Just how can either of them be doing fine when-"

His words were cut off when a wave of icy death thundered its way around and over the protection field, completely encasing the shinigamis in an small eerie dome of semi-darkness. Ichigo flinched yet again as he saw and heard a crack appear on the wall of the protection field.

A second later, all the ice around them shattered to countless blinding, brilliant white shards that promptly disappeared into thin air. A blur of black shot over them to stop twenty feet away - Kladias threw another clawed punch at Rukia, who blocked it and shunpo-ed out of range-

Isane trotted over to crack on the wall, waved a hand over it and the crack vanished.

"_See - _a single attack from one of them cracks what you said _over and over again _is a top-notch protection field. And they're doing fine? This is WAY over being competitive!" Ichigo pointed at the spot where the crack used to be, openly snarling at Shinji.

Clueless to his irritation, Matsumoto clasped a hand in front of her over-large bosom and chirped with the brightest grin on her face, "Rukia-chan's Hakuren sure have improved! Her attitude is so much stronger too. I'm _soooo happy for her!"_

Ichigo grimaced, a hand landing onto his forehead with a resounding slap. _Leave it to her to be idiotically happy in any situation._

"Exactly my point - good practice. And Kladias's doing a nice job of fending Rukia off, so as far as I can see, this is a well-matched ongoing combat. _Now zip it." _said Shinji, sounding like a ticked-off boss of the crowd he actually was.

Ichigo hated being reasoned with _- especially when that reason actually made sense - _"I thought 3rd seats were supposed to tragically crumble in front of a vice-captain's! The hell-"

"Oy, Ichigo," Ikkaku cut him off from left to Shinji, "shut up! 3rd seat, 4th seat, 46th seat - as far as they go, they're titles. And our captain saw the Kurozachs chick as a capable opponent, so what'd you expect?"

_Now it was a 2 on 1 debate. _And Ikkaku had a fair point, one that he had thought of himself a while ago. Ichigo let out a growl and did shut up. _If this thing escalated any more, he was going to jump in, fuck whoever else thought of. He had feeling about the whole thing._

What seemed like well over twentieth ice pillar erupted, this time on the far side of the field. Two tiny figures darted up, down and around it in a dangerous game of tag.

He thought back to the roundup of Kladias's shikai analysis the group of them came up with: the metal claws, which upon further observation, Kladias seemed to be able to freely protract and contract, well over a foot each at their longest and right above the base knuckles of the fingers at shortest. The gun-metal band on her wrists seemed to be made of some other material than metal since it flexed well with the movements. Slightly enhanced speed and strength along with sharpening and hardening of her reiatsu. Someone had brought up healing abilities, since Kladias's injuries seem to have disappeared.

Kladias hurtled down at Rukia to deliver a classic roundhouse kick - the latter's zanpakuto blocked it with a sharp clang, two inches from knocking the head and part of the shoulder clean off her body. Ichigo's heart clenched - that could've been a killing blow.

_Did he mention the four blades that ran down one each on the fronts and backs of Kladias's lower legs? _Her shikai consisted of freaking _fourteen _blades in total, all of which she wielded with deadly accuracy and power.

_Wolverine / vegetable cutter. _He wondered if snorted out loud at the image.

"Suits her well," Hisagi had commented as Kladias impressively fended off Rukia's Hakuren with a bout of spinning kicks and punches, "her swordsmanship is fairly strong, but hand-to-hand combat is her best attribute. Clip on the blades to her hands and legs, and she's weaponed up to excellence." a small frown, "Personality-wise, well... that should be self-explanatory. Undoubtedly destructive, as fourteen blades could be." Ichigo wondered for a moment if he heard a hint of bitterness in the voice but he waved it off, mind elsewhere. He had been leaning towards being worried for Rukia's well-being instead of Kladias's.

_A sudden flash of vertigo _- Ichigo let out a small yelp, hands shooting up to his forehead. He hunched forward slightly and fought to stay on his own two feet as the world spun to black. Several seconds later when he could see the daylight again, he straightened up, hoping no one had noticed. _Fat chance._ Many of the shinigami had their eyes fixed onto him. Shinji's pair of golden eyes flitted back to the combatants when Ichigo's shot them a questioning look.

Hinamori started, "Are you all right, Kurosaki-san? There _is_ a possibility that Kira-kun's kido-"

_A shift of reiatsu from the combatants-_

Ichigo didn't hear Hinamori finish; he noticed a strange sense of familiarity around the altered reiatsu, and he didn't like it. He narrowed his eyes, trying to remember from where, _from where..._

Kladias and Rukia were in the middle of another game of tag around yet another ice pillar, seemingly unaware of the shift.

He looked around to see if anyone else had noticed, and some sure had. He was certain that some of their expressions mirrored the one he had. Even Ragiku-san had crinkled her face up in concentration instead of bursting to squeals of joy about whatever ridiculous reason she could find.

Behind him, Ichigo felt Zangetsu's spurt out a pulse of reiatsu and turned around just in time to watch it lurch itself off the ground, jumping half a foot into the air before landing back with a thud. Ichigo stared at it, incredulous - _was it usual for zanpakutos to hop up all on its own?_

He wondered if he was starting to hallucinate for no reason at all.

"Her eyes turned blue." Hisagi's statement turned his attention back.

Ichigo blurted, "How blue?" _wha- where'd that come from? _"Hold on a sec - _huge-ass _reiatsu shift and all you notice is that Rukia's eyes look blue? Violet, blue, close enough."

Hisagi eyed him suspiciously, "A reiatsu shift? What are you talking about, Kurosaki-san?"

"What happened?" Kira piped in.

Renji beat Ichigo to the retort, "One right now, Hisagi-senpai, Kira. You didn't feel it?" The redhead seemed incredibly awake and alert now, which was impressive considering he had been dead to the world when others dragged him into the protection field as the combat escalated.

"-the hell you two talking about? What weird feeling?" Tetsuzaemon was barking at Ikkaku and Yumichika-

"-what's wrong, Matsumoto-san?" Isane was asking Rangiku. Nanao and Hinamori had clueless looks about them too-

Ichigo was utterly baffled(and pissed), "WHAT THE HELL-" _is going on here?_ Before he finished, he spotted Shinji alone at the edge of the protection field, completely still with arms lowered to his sides. Observing the fight as if no strange phenomenon(or lack thereof) threw his subordinates into chaos behind his back.

Ichigo yelled over, "Shinji! You know something we don't?"

Shinji's head whipped back towards him as if shocked out of a reverie. Ichigo gasped at the eyes - _entirely black sclera, grey irises-_

_Hollowification? Why? What for? Did that cause the shift?_

Before Ichigo could vocalize any of his questions, a sickening crunch rang out nearby. He caught a look of _oh-shit _in Shinji's eyes split second before both of them snapped their heads towards the sound.

The first oddity Ichigo noticed was that the two combatants had come to a stop in front of the protection shield, twenty feet away from it and thirty feet above the ground.

The second: Kladias. Her light blue animalistic eye, to be completely accurate. There was no mistaking from her profile, not even from this distance, that her usual dark-red iris glowed azure as a psychotic pearly-white grin reached to her ear.

Then as the whole picture came into his sight, the world froze. Ichigo's breath caught in his chest, heart deadening and every single nerve of body lighting up as if electrocuted awake from a thousand years of sleep.

The expression on Rukia's face was one of terrified disbelief. Snowy white Sode no Shirayuki still clasped in one hand, her body doubled over the width of Kladias's... _forearm._

The upturned forearm disappeared into right below the center of Rukia's ribs. The wrist and the hand reappeared out the other side. The five fingers huddled close to the center finger, the tips of the five blades coming together to form a haphazard single point. Crimson chunk of _something_ and surprising amount of dark cherry-red liquid clung to the hand, the fingers and the metal.

_A competitive combat, the dangerous game of tag had finally come to a halt, in a rather unexpectedly._

Gravity kicked into gear and the clinging blood began to sag.

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><p><strong>O_O<strong>


	13. Lights, Camera, Wind Back the Clock

**A/N: To those of you who're viewing the message, thank you! I have a feeling that I might be letting some of you down. No, nothing terrible happened to me today to make me feel bad. Just.. yeah.**

**Story's wandering away from its storyline. Just for just one chapter. Kladias's point of view peeks in here and there. Kind of a special backstory.**

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><p><em>February 14th, three months before Ichigo's arrival<em>

Hands sliding open the door with a brutal screech, Kladias blinked as confetties rained down in front of her in white, pink and red swirls of a storm.

When the confetties cleared, she got a good look at the room - and for a second thought she had gotten lost and ended up where she wasn't supposed to be. Then she realized that the ROOM was the one in a state _it was not supposed to be. _Well over fifty shinigamis were packed in there. Every imaginable shades of pink and red clung about _everywhere_ - cottony threads on the walls, frilly tablecloths on usually dark mahogany worktables, hats on shinigamis' heads(?), rice cakes, a westernized record-player draped in the color...

She feverishly flailed at the confetties still raining down at her. _She couldn't believe that she actually contributed to this THING they called a party. All throughout yesterday, she spent... ARRRRRGH-_

_Too much pinkness_. Though half of the mahogany tables hadn't been draped in the awful color; instead, they were piled up precariously against one of the walls, towering almost to the top of the 30-feet high ceiling. The ones that weren't piled up were centered in the middle, agonizingly colorful sweets and other treats laid out in heaps to fill the entire tabletop. Bottles of sake were gathered on another cluster of tables nearby. Conversations buzzed about - people chattered about, some obviously drunk, some obviously drunk but trying hard not to appear so. And failing to.

_Okay, a party in the 9th squad magazine press room. At 2 o'clock in the afternoon. Smackdown in the middle of the week. And the color scheme..._

_What the fuck was WRONG with those people?_

A couple of female shinigamis spotted her standing at the door and waved her over.

"Who died to brew up the ridiculousness?" Kladias positively snarled and screeched at the pair.

One of them hollered back between munches of fuchsia rice cakes, "No one died, Kladias-san! It's Vala- Valantiada! Right, Rangiku-san?"

Rangiku, who had been jabbering away to a pair of entranced-stupid male shinigamis nearby, turned around to them, followed their gaze to Kladias. She then put on a winning smile, "Valentine's Day, actually! It's one of the most _romantic _holidays in the human world. I've been working SO hard to get together a party in such a short notice. Come join us, Dia-chan!"

Kladias perked up and yelped, "Quit calling me that! And your captain's gonna grow an inch before I join this thing."

"Awww...!" Rangiku cooed, further irritating Kladias, and snatched a bottle of sake from the table in front of her, "Then have a bottle of sake instead! Who knows, you might want to join in after a couple swigs!"

At the end of the sentence, the blond vice-captain tossed the bottle casually at Kladias - who, with a disgusted expression on her face, caught it and threw the bottle back at a breakneck speed. The bottle smashed into Rangiku's head, making the vice-captain fall over with an extremely high-pitched squeal that drew every single shinigamis' attention.

"Wha - _are you all right, Rangiku-san?" _Hisagi dropped down to his knees at her side, horror evident on his face.

"That was uncalled for, Kladias-san." Kira grimaced before kneeling down too.

"I hate drinking! And she knew it, so she brought it onto herself." an annoyed glance at Hisagi, "oh _stop fussing,_ _Shuuhei._ Your wet dream's gonna be absolutely fine."

Hisagi flushed ever so slightly but kept his control, his coal-colored eyes shoot up, irritation showing, "How many times do I have you to remind you to address me by my title when-"

Kladias cut through nonchalantly, "You are welcome to remind me however many times you want, comrade. Not like it's gonna help me remember any better." Rangiku rose herself halfway up with a moan, and Kladias spat at her, "_How in the fuck's sake _am I supposed to find my zanpakuto in this mess? You'd better know where it is, blondie."

Rangiku blinked confusedly, rubbing her head where the bottle hit. A realization dawned on her, "Oh, the one I found on the floor was yours? Yes, I know where it is-"

"_Where? _I need it out of here with me before either of us catches any of this awful atmosphere." Kladias snapped.

A coy look slid into Rangiku's expression, "Give someone in the room a kiss, and I'll tell you where."

That caught Kladias by surprise, "Okay, I'll - _wait, what? _What kind of request's that?"

Rangiku chirped, "Valentine's Day is all about," she dramatically threw her arms up in the air, "_love. _Let's see you display some affection for once, Dia- oops, _Kladias-chan!"_

Now on their feet, Kira gave a snort, Hisagi a chuckle. Similar sounds came from all over the room. The rest who hadn't made a sound paled - they were the ones who had witness the 3rd-seat woman's wrath first-hand. The only physical contact she ever displayed usually resulted in someone being carted off to the 4th division in a gurney.

To the second group's surprise, Kladias just rubbed her eyes, "Oh god, you've been drinking again. Hmm." a thoughtful expression, followed by one of mischief crossed over her face, and she shunpo-ed out of everyone's sight-

9th division vice-captain's eyes widened to impossible size as he was ambushed with an ever so slight peck on the cheek.

"Wha-" Hands flying up to his cheek, Hisagi's mouth fell open in utter disbelief. Rangiku shrieked with laughter, immediately to be joined by several others. As Kladias hopped back a few steps with a huge characteristic ear-to-ear grin(victorious?) on her face, Hisagi spluttered in attempt to form words, failing to do so in the end. His face turned fire-engine red, his mouth still hanging wide open. Chuckles rang out all around, amused at seeing the usually stoic and expressionless senior officer in that state.

_"That," _Kladias, still grinning, pointed a finger at Hisagi's scarred cheek, to the spot she gave a peck, "was your way of paying for making me cut out those confetties _all yesterday. _You know that my arms were actually SORE last night? That's saying something, since I'm used to sparring all day with a freaking _sword _in my hand. The kami's honest truth."

Hisagi choked out, "What? How'd this... Why in the... Not my fau... _Oh, the how am I supposed to discipline you by the end of the month, Captain..._" he groaned and put both this hands on his forehead, and blushed even deeper, which drew even more chuckles from the crowd.

Kladias's grinned even wider, "_Theeeeere_ we go! Our badass, fierce warrior of a vice-captain is revealing his true colors once again," a bout of laughter from the crowd, ", pun intended. Enjoy the fire-engine show while it's on, and remember to add it to the collection of good old memories to make fun of him later on, folks."

Rangiku, having gotten up to get away at some point, tossed a zanpakuto at Kladias. The latter caught it reflexively, "That's the way, blondie. Go throw up or something now, Hisagi. Or just faint and stop paling tomatoes before people start suffocating."

Indeed, some of the shinigami were rolling on the floor, out of breath in howls of silent laughter. _Oh, how they loved seeing the 3rd-seat mischief of a woman give difficult times to her vice-captain._

"I'm out of here." With that curt, sudden announcement, Kladias spun around and darted towards the exit, zanpakuto clutched in one hand.

Rangiku gasped to a pause between her laughters just long enough shout out at the sleeves of shihakusho disappearing out the open door, "Happy Valentine's Day, Kladias-chan, and good luck with your training!"

* * *

><p>Kladias heard Rangiku's shout, and grimaced. She turned her head to shout back, "Go screw yourself!"<p>

Turning forward again, she broke into a quick run. She looked down at the plain, non-descript standard-hilted zanpakuto in her hand. It was frustrating how she was on the verge of breaking through the barrier blocking her zanpakuto spirit... Several times the damn hell-tempered feline roared out his name, the sound distorted to something inaudible to her ears. Kladias huffed out a breath in annoyance.

She muttered to herself, "I take that back, Rangiku-san."

_Then she barely whispered, "I might just take the good luck part.."_

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><p><strong>Happy Valentine's Day to you, dear readers!<strong>_  
><em>


	14. Relapse

**A/N**: **Hi you! I'm back. And so is teh plot.  
><strong>

* * *

><p><em>The expression on Rukia's face was one of terrified disbelief. Snowy white Sode no Shirayuki still clasped in one hand, her body doubled over the width of Kladias's... forearm.<em>

_The upturned forearm disappeared into right below the center of Rukia's ribs. The wrist and the hand reappeared out the other side. The five fingers huddled close to the center finger, the tips of the five blades coming together to form a haphazard single point. Crimson chunk of something and surprising amount of dark cherry-red liquid clung to the hand, the fingers and the metal._

_A competitive combat, the dangerous game of tag had finally come to a halt, in a rather unexpectedly._

_Gravity kicked into gear and the clinging blood began to sag._

* * *

><p>Shinji was onto Kladias before anyone else, tackling her away from Rukia. The arm came free with a haunting squelch, and Rukia's limp form start to fall-<p>

Ichigo was vaguely aware of a shout leaving his mouth as he reached his arms out to catch her-

Sensation of being hurtled through the air, bones of his body rattling as ground smashed onto his back. Blurry pieces of dirt and grass flew up. Not even pausing to groan at the sudden impact, warrior's reflex sprang him back to his feet immediately, adrenaline kicking in in full. He leaped backwards as something dove down at him-

_Sode no Shirayuki?_

The zanpakuto had plunged tip-first into the grass the exact spot he had been. A single drop of dark liquid on the blade trailed down its pure white perfection-

"I am sorry, Kurosaki-san!" Kira cried from farther away, as he gently hastily stepped down onto the grass along with Isane, Nanao and Hinamori. The four of them were surrounding Rukia, who had just been finished being lowered gently onto her back. As pale yellow light was done filling the rectangular space formed by the four shinigamis, Isane hurried up to Rukia's side and kneeled down, her face mask of a trained medical professional she was, hands rolling up the sleeves of her shihakusho as the fingers began to glow with white light.

The remaining three raised their to their sides to steady the yellow light field, and Kira continued, "I had to knock you away. If you had caught vice-captain Kuchiki like you would have, it would have worsened her con-"

"Whatever!" Ichigo didn't want to hear it. He sprang to a run towards them - _please please please don't let her... not after what she's gone through not all the odds they've beaten together she couldn't possibly just... just like that, she can't be-_

Ichigo cried out as an invisible force jerked the center of his body back, three feet from the yellow lightfield. He started forward and the it happened again, force throwing him back farther away. Anger boiling up, he looked up to spot Kira's hand outstretched towards him. Ichigo opened his mouth to scream to cut it out for the sake of his sanity, because all those Kido control was starting to piss him off BIG time and the way it was going_, the Kido-freak was going to pay for it-_

Kira's hand gave a twitch-

Ichigo choked as the air was cut off in his throat, as if a leash had clasped around his throat. Sense of deja vu flashed, but he shoved it back, more immediate concerns at hand. A feeling foreign reiatsu around his neck told him that leash was exactly what had happened to his throat.

Humiliation flooding into the whorls of anger, he glared at Kira as menacingly he could manage and reached behind to grab Zangetsu - and swore silently(only because his air supply was cut off) as his hand clenched thin air - he had left it behind the protection field when he jumped up.

"Kurosaki-san, please! Calm yourself down! _You are putting Rukia-san's life in danger!"_

The last bit of information, along with a hint of genuine panic in Kira's controlled voice, froze Ichigo from letting loose his brewing hellfire of fury.

The panicky wielder of the leash explained hurriedly, as if afraid Ichigo would just go on and lose his head anyway, "Her pathway between the Hakutsui and Saketsu - the sources and the supporting points of reiatsu - had been pierced. The injury to a normal shinigami body is big enough of a problem already, but in case of Rukia-san's, she had been inflicted serious damage from powerful enemies around the two pressure points in the past, making the areas around extremely fragile to any further damage."

Flashbacks - _Aizen's fingers, plunging into the base of Rukia's neck to retrieve the Hougyoku. Streets of Karakura, a hand sinking into her abdomen. Grim expression on Byakuya's face as he retold Rukia's battle with an Espada._

Ichigo could see the point, but what'd that have to do with his proximity to her?

It was as if Kira had read Ichigo's mind, "You possess a very, _very_ powerful reiatsu, Kurosaki-san. And you have absolutely no control over it. Vice-captain Hinamori, vice-captain Ise and I are considered above others when it comes to the control, but yet vice-captain Kotetsu, being one of _the _top medical experts in Seireitei, is the only one who is able to approach vice-captain Kuchiki safely. Come any closer, and you will disrupt the very flow of Kuchiki-san's life force."

Kira twitched his hand again and the choker around Ichigo's throat dispersed. Even though he seemed to think Ichigo an impossibility when it came to kido, he apparently didn't think him stupid enough not to understand the severity of the situation.

Ichigo stood rooted to his spot, nails digging into the palm of his hands, every muscle of his body paralyzed with... _fear? Worry? Desperation? Ahh...!_

Rukia looked so pale. Too pale. Violet irises had blank, clouded looks about them. Ichigo's heart gave a terrible lurch when his eyes took in the dark void below her ribcage. Darkness. Crimson. _She's losing too much blood._

_This couldn't be happening._

_Rukia isn't going to die, she isn't going to die, she isn't going to die she isn't going to die she can't be dying she-_

_She twitched?_

"She's relapsing!" Isane yelped, white glow of her hands brightening and horror flickering across her face before it resumed the expressionless mask. Hinamori's face whitened, and Nanao, who had her back to Ichigo, stiffened.

Ichigo blenched. His throat, having been closed up on itself long ago, tightened even more. He didn't need his doctor of father to provide the simplified meaning - _Rukia's situation's just got more complicated. Complication =/= good._

Kira's yelp was one of disbelief, "That can't be! This is the first time Colonel Kurozachs has inflicted any notable damage onto Kuchiki-san-"

"I don't know! I can't figure it out!" With that, Isane started an incredibly rapid stream of words Ichigo couldn't catch. The white light that had been surrounding Rukia flashed to neon-green. And just like that, Rukia froze.

Hinamori choked out a gasp and Kira gawked at Isane as if she had just committed a murder. Nanao stayed still.

Isane took in a deep breath, eyes closed, "*****Jikanteishi. Thank heavens that they lifted the ban on the spell last year. Time is running out for Kuchiki-san - we need Captain Unohana." her head jerked up to address her fellow officers, "I'll maintain the healing rectangle. Hinamori-san, Ise-san, Kira-san, please prepare a ******Koukanteni - _I wouldn't be suggesting it if there was any other way!"_ she cried as the three of them flinched in unison, "To the 4th division headquarters. Step into the healing rectangle, give the Koukanteni everything you have, and we just might be able to teleport the section."

Giving into the medical expert, the three shinigamis jumped into the yellow lightfield and whipped around, backs to the middle.

"Hey, what the- _wait a sec!"_ Ichigo started forward -

And of course Kira's invisible barrier tossed him back.

Tremendous reiatsu built up around the five shinigamis seconds before brilliant green light flooded Ichigo's vision. He scrunched his eyes up, arms flying up to his face in an attempt to keep from being blinded for the umpteenth time in the day.

_Tick-tock._ The reiatsu vanished. Ichigo lowered his arms and reopened his eyes. Swore out loud as he saw black.

Few eyeblinks, and the blackness shrunk to dots. Disappearing few more seconds later.

A shallow, healing-field sized crater was all that remained of where the five shinigami had been standing.

* * *

><p><strong>*Jikanteishi : Kido - Temporal Statis is the actual translation, let's just call it Time-Stopper the sake of simplicity...<br>**

****Koukanteni : Kido - Spatial Displacement** **the actual translation, Teleportation the simplified version.**

**Tessai had used those 100-years ago, to save the Vizards from hollowifying completely. Back then it was forbidden, in here the ban's been lifted when the Vizards joined the Seireitei forces.**

**See ya!**

**Edit: Oh yeah. Kladias's shikai sketch is up on my deviantART page - link is on my profile, image is the featured one. Though I, being the usual me, forgot to draw the blades on the leg. *SPOILER ALERT* since the second stage hadn't been revealed yet here...  
><strong>


	15. Taunt

So, here Ichigo stood frozen on the spot, staring at the crater that yielded to him nothing useful. Kido was going to be the death of him - turning his Zanpakuto useless in a fight, shutting him up like a muzzle would, throwing him around like some rag doll... Swearing at the whole damn universe until his throat was raw sounded like a _great _idea but he decided against it at the very last moment. He doubted the universe was going to do anything about the complaints.

He closed his eyes and grimaced. _He failed to protect someone he held dear. Again. _He should've noticed that something was seriously off when Rukia plunged into an uncharacteristically state of sheer panic. Never mind that she recovered relatively fast afterwards. Hell, he should've caught something from the lethal expression she wore right before start of the combat. She was acting far out of character. He should've jumped in and stopped the combat before it spun out of control. On the other hand, Kladias-

_Kladias._

Ichigo's head whipped around in search - he had completely forgotten about her, having been too caught up with Rukia's state.

He found her presence at the far side of the field immediately started sprinting towards it. Details came to his sight as he got closer; she was surrounded by a circle of the five remaining vice-captains. All of their weapons drawn to their shikai state. Shinji stood in front of her, one hand clasped around her throat to lift her feet off the ground, the other hovering over her wrists to keep the kido binding in place. The blades of her hands glistened sickly crimson, reflecting the light from the cloudy sky as she squirmed and twisted. Ichigo deduced that there must've been a kido binding around her ankles, since she wasn't kicking out at Shinji.

Few droplets of red marred the white expanse of the captain's haori. Blood was seeping out of shallow cuts on Hisagi's bicep, Tetsuzaemon's hand, Ikkaku's forehead and Yumichika's cheek. Renji's usually-tied-up hair hung loose all around his face - _so there had been a struggle capturing Kladias. _The woman looked pretty bloodied up too.

Shinji's face was barely an inch away from Kladias's, the fast-moving lips, clenched jaw and other body languages demanding answers. Kladias, however, seemed to be opting to answer with a feral snarl of open contempt.

Her dark red eyes glinted azure again, sending a physical shock through Ichigo's body that he almost tripped over his own feet.

Then her lips moved - barely. Shinji's eyes brightened in some acute realization and the hand that had been hovering over Kladias's wrists glowed and slammed into her face, knocking her unconscious upon either the impact or the kido. Shinji dropped her down to her feet none too gently and held her away by the throat as she sagged forwards to him.

Ichigo had plunged into the circle of vice-captains by the time Shinji started barking out orders,

"Matsumoto! Iba! Carry _her_" Shinji thrusted Kladias out to an arm's length, "to the 12th. Back alleyways. Don't be seen. Shuuhei," Hisagi flinched as Shinji shot him an unreasonably venomous glare, "the hell're you still doing here? Go. _Now!"_

Rangiku and Tetsuzaemon hurriedly reverted their zanpakutos back to their normal state, sheathed them and shunpo-ed up to grab hold onto Kladias. Murmured exchange of words, and Tetsuzaemon threw the unconscious woman over his shoulder and started into the forest. Rangiku jogged to catch up.

Hisagi was already nowhere to be seen, obviously having understood the vague instruction.

"Hinamori, head back to our headquarters. Kira, go find your captain too before- _where'd they go?" _Shinji whirled around frantically on the spot.

_Ironic, how Shinji expected Hisagi to be gone, but not others. _Ichigo just spoke up flatly, "Isane, Nanao and they teleported Rukia to the 4th division. They needed Unohana-san." _He sounded much calmer than he felt. So. Much. Calmer._

_"WHAT?"_ color drained out of Shinji's face, "Oh shit, shit shit shit shit- _this is bad."_

That ticked Ichigo off into an outburst, "That's the only thing you can think of - that this is BAD? Rukia's barely holding on! We - _I_ should've stopped them, I should've seen this coming. She was freaking out beforehand." The half of it was directed more to himself than anyone else. He warily glanced around for Renji, wondering how he was doing midst of all of this. Not on the scene _- he must've gone running to Byakuya the moment Shinji knocked her out-_

_Oh, hell. Byakuya's going to be enraged when he hears the news. _Ichigo hoped that the poor messenger wouldn't be shot at.

Shinji's yelp brought Ichigo's attention back, "You two," at Ikkaku and Yumichika, "_scat._ Not a word to anyone. Ones who need to be notified will be notified when they need to be, how they need to be. That's an order." the pair of them nodded, looking slightly miffed, and shunpo-ed out of sight.

Ichigo was left standing alone with Shinji, who looked to be on verge of panicking, hands clutching the top of his head, busily muttering to himself. Ichigo caught only parts of the rambles-

"...Abarai's gone? Screw it, Kuchiki brat's going to be annoying to deal with. Rose, Kensei... Central 46... 4th division's bound to let the news out-"

Ichigo was rambling on the inside - _how was Rukia? Why did Kladias do... that to her? Possessed? Her eyes. The grin, the stance. _Familiarity crashed onto closed his eyes and rubbed the back of his neck - it was as if there was a physical barrier between what he was seeing and the memory the sight called forth. It made his head spin and throb.

But he had no problem recalling the shift in Shinji's eyes when Kladias spoke, right before she was blacked out.

Ichigo had to yell out Shinji's name a couple times and then resort to a slap on the shoulder before the captain's attention was focused onto him,

"What'd she say? _Kladias_. What did she say to you before you knocked her out?"

Shinji gave him a wide-eyed look close to disbelief, as if caught off-guard by the question. "What?" Ichigo snapped. _Perfectly reasonable question._

Split second past and decision glazed over Shinji's face. He bent down to retrieve something from the ground and spun around to break into a stride towards the forest. _Without answering Ichigo's question._

_"HEY!" _Ichigo yelped. "Answer me! No way that was a hard question. What'd she say that made you freak the hell out-"

"Follow along, Ichigo," Shinji cut through without breaking his stride, voice back to his casual drawl, "seems like you've got some catching up to do."

Ichigo blinked. _Okay, still not the answer._ He could choose not to complain and get the full story or drive a punch into Shinji's oh-so-calm-now face for tempting him with a bait. _The latter sounded nice, since the temper within was screaming to get out. But... the full story. _He realized that he still knew next to nothing about what happened in Seireitei after the Winter War.

A songbird shrieked out a pained note at the same time as Ichigo shouted at Shinji to wait up. _However useless Zangetsu proved to be today, he wasn't going to just ditch it._

* * *

><p>Ichigo stepped back and insisted, "NO! I'm not going back in there!"<p>

Shinji glared at him skeptically, "You have the audacity to march into Seireitei uninvited, skewer all shapes and sizes of hollows yet you're scared to walk into a sewage system?"

"I'm not scared!"As a matter of fact, Ichigo _had_ been in there before, with Hanatarou and Ganjou, to avoid the authorities back when they were trying to stop the execution. The depressing underground cavity brought back even more depressing memories. Also, he hadn't been able to smell a thing after being in the sheer stench of the place.

"No matter how _terrifying_ it would be for you, it's one of the best ways there are to travel without bumping into people." Shinji bend down to claw at the edge of the slab plate on the ground.

"Can't you just use kido - snap a finger and disappear? Activate invisibility? Use Koukate-whatever like they did with-" _like the did with Rukia?_ But her name wouldn't come up to his lips...

Shinji had managed to pull off the plate to reveal a square hole with stairs leading down, "We don't use kido for everything - too disconcerting. The 12th division keeps track of all unusual reiatsu activity within the walls of Seireitei, and Koukateni - the kido those idiots used, the one you must be talking about now - already attracted too much attention."

Ichigo pondered why Shinji was insisting such secrecy. Granted, what had happened was... _terrible? Horrifying? Unbelievable? Unforgivable-_

_He was getting off-topic._ Could it be as simple as that Shinji was trying to avoid getting into...trouble? _Rukia was on death's doorstep and the stupid blond was just concerned about his status? _That thought enraged Ichigo,

"Screw the caution to hell! Do you realize how unbelievably selfish of you to think of the troubles _you'd_ be getting into when someone else's is- is- might already be _dead?_ Well, sucks to be you because there were more than half a dozen witnesses of your half-assed control of the situation and I personally wouldn't hesitate to _destroy_ you for even thinking of it for _even a second_-_" _

"Ahh! Ichigo - _shut up!"_ Shinji widened his eyes and held up both of his hands up in a mock-surrender. His tone was incredulous but perfectly serious, "You think I'm trying to cover my ass for what happened? _You think I'm stupid? _I'm going to take full responsibility for the situation all right." He huffed out a breath, "Besides, you have to give me more credit than that; if I _really_ wanted to get away with it, there are loads of alternatives actions I could have taken to make the bunch of you forget about everything-"

_WHAM! _Ichigo planted his fist into dead-center of Shinji's face. The captain was caught off-guard, and flew into the square hole on the ground, down the stairs... _How dare he, _Ichigo thought,_ how CAN he make a joke like that, now, of all times?_ And man, did it feel good - Ichigo had been feeling like punching someone for a LONG while now. A final thud, groans mixed with swearings told him that the blond has successfully reached the bottom of the stairs. No splash.

_Pity._ But Ichigo was too irritated to change that. He turned himself around and was about to sprint away when Shinji's sing-songy voice taunted from behind him,

"Ichiiiiiii-go! The only way you're going to get that catching-up while traveling through here! Underground cavity is one of the only places there aren't any surveilance."

Ichigo faltered his step and grimaced. Of _course _he wanted the information that was being offered to him. One too many times his so-called allies have concealed critical information from him, the ones that could have solved many mysteries for him before he dived into the situation to solve it himself and brewed up more trouble than before. On the other hand, _he didn't want to be manipulated into going somewhere he didn't want to! _And he didn't want to be traveling alongside the freaking sewage channels. But... _he wanted to know what's going on, damn it!_

Ichigo sighed.

Coming to a decision, he spun on one heel to head back towards the entrance to the underground cavity. He came to a stop at the very front of it, took a deep breath of fresh air - he was going to miss it, he was sure.

One foot in front of another, Ichigo descended down the stairs. Fetid stench of the place whooshed into his face, bringing back unwelcome memories... _Time ticking away, helplessness and guilt enveloping him. Smell of his own blood mixed with the sewage._

Ichigo hoped that he hadn't been traumatized by what happened more than a year ago. Not like he needed another worry to choke him stupid...


	16. Recount

**A/N: Sorry 'bout that - been more than a week, already, _seriously?_ The procrastinator within me is sure rearing. On another note, all of the schoolteachers in my province are striking for what must be incredibly serious reasons that I don't really know of. Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, no school. Five-day weekend? Sweetness! 8D**

**Anyhow, onwards...**

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><p>Shinji peered at Ichigo from the corner of his eyes, "Do you know how Kladias got recruited to the Gotei 13?"<p>

"No." Ichigo answered curtly, though he was eager to hear. _Finally,_ he thought,_ he's about to pass on information. _The two of them were now quickly weaving through the series of walkways of the tunnel, senses alert for any sounds out of place.

Minus the sense of smell. Ichigo's nose has been numbed to uselessness the first few minutes of breathing underground. At least he couldn't smell the stench either.

Shinji had manipulated Ichigo to following along with promise of information. After they got away from the opening for a bit. _After he figured out which way to head to. After he found the landmark he was looking for. _Ichigo's patience had run out to the point he seriously considered shoving Shinji into the river of crap, but thankfully for the captain, conversation's lit up.

"Then you have to know. Keep your opinions to yourself 'till I'm done recapping, since I'd be able to get through it faster-"

"Is that really_ the _most important thing happened in Soul Society while I was stuck in the human world?" Ichigo cut through, completely ignoring the point in making.

Shinji shot him a glare and then sighed, "There's a reason I'm choosing to explain that first."

"Why?" But Ichigo did indeed decide to listen, since it occurred to him that his question would be answered soon enough.

"After Aizen got shoved into prison, while the Central 46 kept bashing each other about their two cents on Kensei, Rose and my return to captaincy," Shinji started, "stronger-than-normal hollows were popping up all over in Soul Society. Nowhere near strong as Arrancars, but enough to be too much for the majority of the shinigami force to handle with ease." he added when he saw the horror flick across Ichigo's face.

"The captains gathered up strong fighters from their divisions to form elimination squads to deal specifically with those hollows. The initial order from the old man was for the squads to be a mix of members from various divisions to balance out the strength or whatever," an annoyed flick of a hand, "but who gave a damn, we all stuck to our divisions. The shinigamis of 13 squads couldn't get along if the Spirit King himself ordered them to. Anyways, that's irrelevant.

"So we had the elimination squads, half a dozen high-class fighters each, roaming the countryside and the city roads alike. Then an unexpected trouble smacks one of Soi-Fon's stronger squads in the face, middle of March."

Shinji signaled Ichigo to a stop, and after a moment, he rounded a corner. He continued on,

"Long-winded incident report made short - the the 2nd division's top elimination squad, all above 10th-seats, responds to hollow presence in the North Rukongai District seventies-forest. When they get there, the hollow's gone and instead they bump into a civilian who apparently took the matters into her own hands before the squad came. What the squad described as a 'strange quality' with her provokes the entire of the six-man squad enough to try to arrest her."

"Why would they want to capture Kladias?" Ichigo didn't bother asking if it was her - it was _her _story after all. Not to mention she did have a hell of a mouth.

Contrary to his previous irritation, Shinji didn't really seem to mind the interruption, "They left it at that - one part of the report that could've used more detail, they kept it simpler." he tut-tutted, "It could have been the fact a non-shinigami was strong enough to deal with a hollow that gave trouble to trained shinigamis, and they saw her as a potential threat.

"Anyhow, as you could guess, no way Kladias went down without putting up a decent fight. It actually would have been a spectacle, since three of the six shinigamis were rendered unconscious by the time they managed to knock her out." Shinji fixed a silent stare on Ichigo with raised eyebrows. When the latter stared back in confusion, he widened his eyes even more and gave a slight nod. As if expecting a spontaneous reaction from the clueless orange-head.

"What?" expression unchanged, Ichigo snapped at Shinji - he actually had no idea what there was to react to. _Kladias made it to 3rd seat, so no surprise there?_

"Oh, come on!" Shinji threw his hands up in exasperation, "Don't tell me you can't see the significance! Or.. never mind. You've never spent any time training with average shinigamis." the last part had been somewhat apologetic. Then he continued, "Though they would certainly seem weak to you, powers of any officers above 10th seat are on a whole different dimension from the ones below. Soi-Fon's squad specialize in hand-to-hand combat, and for a civilian to beat down one, let alone _three_, in what they specialize, was enough to throw the offices of Gotei 13 into a mild havoc."

"How was I supposed to know!" Ichigo retorted, "Not my fault that your government underestimates just about everything. They underestimated me, a mere human-turned-shinigami, too, remember?"

Shinji mumbled something under his breath. They rounded another corner, stepped up a few stairs onto another walkway, and Shinji turned back to the recap, "So they drag unconscious Kladias into the barracks, throw her to jail because that's what they do with whomever they're not sure what to do about. Then the Central 46 call in the captains to take time to argue about whether sending out an invitation for her to join one of the squads would be appropriate. The logical practical thinkers argued that we needed every strong warrior we could get our hands on, especially when everyone had been unsettled by the whole ordeal with Aizen Sousuke. The oppositions' opinions was that it would be an_ injury _to Seireitei's pride to invite an _unruly, disrespectful civilian _in." the blond captain tossed his head up and let out a scoff.

"What was there to be disrespectful about?" Ichigo threw his two cents in as he kicked aside an unidentified-round-object on the ground, "Soldiers jump you for no reason, you defend yourself with all you got." _Common sense lands you in jail? The world was getting more and more screwed up. Both the human world and this one._

Shinji defended himself, "Hey, don't generalize - I was all for the invitation! Majority of us were. Decision was made to attempt to recruit her, and an order was given out to get Kladias out of jail and send her over to the 12th for analysis, to determine which squad she'd do best in.

"The next thing we know, she's sentenced to Maggot's Nest for life. No official report issued on it." abrupt silence came after that, only interrupted by the churning of the river from the side.

_Was that bitterness Ichigo detected in the voice?_

The silence stretched on few more seconds than necessary.

"You know," Ichigo drawled, "from how you overly dramatize the way you speak of the place and the name itself, I get the idea that it's not the greatest happening ever, but _what the hell is the Maggot's Nest?"_

Shinji flickered a wary look from the corner of his eyes, "It's a special type of prison we have in Seireitei. If the Central 46 deduces someone as a potential threat to Soul Society, Maggot's Nest is the place to go. Insanity's the most often the reason, but sometimes it's an unfathomable, unfamiliar talent of a sort that we have no idea what would become of. Half the members of 12th Division had been there at one point or the other. But in Kladias's case, it was neither."

They rounded yet another corner into yet another tunnel. Ichigo was beginning to wonder just _how much longer_ they had to travel through this place... _And how many more times Shinji was going to use silence as a way of dramatizing what he was going to say?_

Ichigo glared and made sure that disapproval and sarcasm was dripping from his voice, "You got me. I'm curious, I'm intrigued, I'm _dying _to hear what you say. _Now get on with it, will you? _And how far 'till we get out of this shithole?" _Yup, he was getting tired of being in here. _He saw that they were walking towards what he thought was a dead-end, but upon further inspection, there was _yet another_ tunnel branching off to the side. "How'd you know the way through this place?" he muttered quietly.

Shinji grimaced and didn't even give out a smart-aleck retort,

"Turns out the Central 46 landed her along with the insane and the notoriously dangerous because she had some Hollow in her."

Ichigo whipped his head towards Shinji - _that was not what he was expecting to hear. At all._

"She's a _Vizard?"_ was the first thing that came to Ichigo's mouth, _"What the hell-"_ he cursed as he tripped over his own feet. He caught himself just in time not to fall off into the river of crap beside them.

Shinji gave Ichigo a smack on the back of the head as he passed by, _almost_ knocking him into the river, "_No._"

Ichigo flinched at the smack and scrambled to follow - _damn, where'd his dignity go _- "Then what do you mean-"

"She's not a Vizard. Yet. Whatever. She just has a small, tiny, _miniscule_ amount of hollow reiatsu in the core of her soul that she doesn't even know of. Most shinigamis don't know - it was only under the scrutiny of the 12th's latest technology it was discovered." Shinji's tone was explanatory, "Nowhere in the entire library of Soul Society's records said anything about natural part-hollow Rukongai residents. Central 46 freaked the hell out."

"But how... Wha... _Dammit!"_ Ichigo stammered and swore under his breath as he caught up. The jumble of frantic thoughts crisscrossing his mind didn't seem to want to form themselves into comments nor questions. _Kladias? Hollow? NOT. Funny._

"How'd she get out?" was surprisingly the first coherent sentence that came out of Ichigo's mouth.

Shinji sounded insulted, "You think we'd let her rot in there after hearing the reason she got in there in the first place?"

"You lost me - _who're we?_ Just explain. Straight-forward. I HATE the riddles and meaningful silences you seem to love so much." Ichigo grumbled the last part more to himself.

A sigh, "Us, the _Vizards,_ dumbass. Who else? There was no way we were going to let someone close to our kind to be discriminated to a life's sentence in an asylum."

A quiet "Oh." was Ichigo's admission that that had been quite obvious.

Shinji scoffed and continued, "I doubt the Central 46 was caught off-guard. If they are half less stupid as they used to be, the would have been expecting us to argue, hence the initial secrecy. But boy, the look on their faces when the eight of us crashed their little gathering." A quiet chuckle, "Long story short, we won the case - one that should _not_ have been a case in the first place. Kensei was the one who was the most, uh," Shinji cringed and gingerly rubbed a palm over an ear, _"vocal _about the matter, so he was put in charge of the 'trouble,' as they put it. Hacchi came up with a kido to mask the Hollow part of her as to mask the reiatsu for the time being. From then on..."

The sentence faded to silence as Shinji ducked into a narrow, dark tunnel that looked like they would have to single-file through, Ichigo followed few steps behind. "Shouldn't be long now until we see light of the day again." former mumbled. Ichigo waited to see if the he would continue, but the silhouette ahead of him stayed wordless. Drippings of water got louder and sounds of river faded.

_It was strangely comforting,_ _how Vizards stuck up for Kladias, _Ichigo thought. There hadn't been a choice for him when it came to being part-hollow, and he was pretty sure it had been the same for the rest of the Vizards after hearing the recount of what happened a century ago. Then something occurred to him, an answer to a question he asked Shinji a while ago,

"Was that why?" Ichigo asked.

Shinji briefly threw a glance back, "Why what, Ichigo?"

Ichigo spoke up louder this time, "The reason you guys, the Vizards, returned to Soul Society. Was it to stand up for your-_" _he caught himself in time, remembering that he was a Vizard too, _"our _kind, in the case more showed up? I mean, it's not entirely our fault we have hollow power in us, and apparently Seireitei's still opposed to the idea of working together with individuals other than us..." he had absolutely no idea how to end his long-winded question and it wasn't in his nature to want to babble on about politics and whatnot, so he let the last sentence fade. He resisted a strong urge to slap himself in the forehead.

Fortunately, Shinji didn't comment on the lack of eloquence. The blond glanced back again, and when he spoke, his tone wasn't judging, "Good one, Ichigo; now thinking, partially, yes. Though I kind of wish I came up with that on my own."

Baffled by the uncharacteristic show of kindness, Ichigo frowned. Shinji wasn't insulting him or anything, but... the response had been too mild to be normal. _Might as well get back to point - _he yelled out, "Hey - _so what?_ Kladias has hollow in her. Just how much does that have to do with what happened today?"

Instead of answering, Shinji ducked out of the narrow passageway they had been traveling through to an enormous, empty chamber, Ichigo following closely behind. The former trotted up to a stop in front of a shiny steel ladder that looked out of place on the grimy wall. Ichigo looked up, and to his horror, the ladder faded into the start darkness above and he couldn't make out where the top was.

"We're here. Up, up, up and out, I'll let loose the theory I have, to you and to rest of the crowd." Shinji hopped up onto the first rung of the ladder, and started going up.

Confusion, questions, muddled truths and the general screw-ups of the current situation aside, Ichigo screamed inwardly at the thought of climbing up the damn ladder - _who knew how far up the thing went?_

_He sure hoped his arms would fare the journey up._ He grabbed onto the rung with a groan and started up.

* * *

><p><strong>Next chapter'll be up quicker than how long it took to put up this one - I promise :(<strong>


	17. Florescent Secrecy

**A/N: Oy! ...*thinks of nifty, witty things to say here***

***finds none*  
><strong>

**Uh, next chapter's up below~ ^_^;  
><strong>

* * *

><p>Ichigo blurted out yet again, "Are we there yet?"<p>

And yet again, Shinji replied from above, "No."

"Howabout now?"

_"No. _Shut up, you're ticking me off." the blond captain spat out, words slathered with annoyance. His next step up the ladder was a stomp that vibrated the entire structure.

_Good,_ Ichigo thought as he unflinchingly stepped up another rung of the ladder and pulled himself up. And another. And another after that. He was sure it had been more than half an hour that they had been climbing, and he was brimming with complaints on the inside - _First a shit-smelling hike underground and now a never-ending ladder climb in the pitch dark? If it turns out all the effort wasn't worth it, Shinji was going to be marinated in cyanide._ The dim yellow light from below vanished a long time ago, engulfing them in pure, claustrophobic blackness. Which was somewhat ironic; judging by how the sound of feet on metal rungs never echoed, the place was vast. The claustrophobic part maybe had to do with the fact that they were the only ones making even the slightest rustles. _No wind. No drips of water. _That probably meant there was no danger nearby, but Ichigo wouldn't have minded some white noise to keep his ears occupied.

_The silence unsettled him._ He hoped that they'd be getting out to somewhere with more... _life_ sometime soon. His arms and legs weren't tired yet, but strap of Zangetsu was cutting into his shoulder, and it _hurt._ As if the damn zanpakuto was getting heavier as it got more useless. Also, he was getting impatient with all the questions he had no answers to-

_What WAS this place? What place was he GOING to? What theory did Shinji have - _the blond remained stubbornly silent about it. _Also, the hell was up with Kladias?_

Skip to the biggest question - _Rukia. How was she doing? For sure she didn't-_

_NO._ He gripped the next rung of the ladder with a bit more force than necessary. _He wasn't going to allow himself to think about that_. It wouldn't be of any help to the current situation - whatever the hell it was - for him to get panicked about it. He needed a way to distract himself, and that unfortunately involved more of bugging a particular person-

"So any chance we're there no- _MMPH!"_ his teeth mercilessly clashed together as something narrow and hard slammed down onto his head, drawing out a painful _crack_ from the back of his neck. Unable to nurse both of the sore spots(let go of the ladder entirely = fall back), he grimaced and rubbed the top of his head. He was positive that the narrow-and-hard object in question had been Shinji's foot, and yelped upwards,

"Bastard, _you just tried to kill me?_ There's no question what would've happened if I fell back all the way down-"

_"Shut UP!"_ Shinji spat down at him again and Ichigo could sense the blond's murderous glare directed at him through the darkness, "I wonder if I should've done exactly that. Kick our brand new Lieutenant-Colonel Kurosaki down to his death deep within the sewage tunnels. Honorable demise."

Before Ichigo could let out a retort, Shinji continued in a quieter voice, "But we're here,_ thank the gods._ I don't know how much more of this place I can stand."

_Huh,_ Ichigo thought as he rubbed the back of his neck, _so he wasn't the only one freaked out by the place._

A ball of brilliant white-yellow light burst above Ichigo, making him squint against the sudden brightness. Several seconds later when the light lessened and his eyes adjusted, he saw that Shinji had his right arm outstretched to the side, hand clutching a ball of bright yellow flames. Squeeze of the hand, and bright white outline of a door-sized rectangle appeared on the wall in front of it, soon filled with the same bright white light.

Twitch of fingers, and the ball of flames disappeared from Shinji's hand. He then said, "In there," and then leaped off the ladder and into the rectangle. The captain sank into the white doorway as if through a solid wall, the end of his haori last to disappear.

Eager to get away from the darkness, Ichigo clambered up the ladder to directly beside the doorway and leaped in. His eyes grew wide - he had been expecting a walk through a senkai gate, not a sensation of being suspended mid-air with every joints of his bones being stretched. Not painful, but unpleasant. A heartbeat later, he landed on the balls of his feet on smooth, wooden floor.

..._Wooden?_

Ichigo darted his eyes around and was baffled by the scene in front of him. _Everything was slightly too... normal._ Regular squad office hallway stretched out endlessly to either sides of him, complete with wooden sliding doors, slightly chipped frames and plaques that labeled each of the rooms. _Not even a bit like a secret dungeon a secret organization would gather at._

Then he glanced behind him and saw no trace of the doorway he just came through. Just a blank off-white, windowless plaster wall that stretched forever to either sides. Looking up, twenty feet above him, he spotted basketball-sized florescent lightbulbs hanging at regular intervals, steady, unblinking white brightness harsh on his eyes. He averted his gaze back down. _Now that's more like it,_ he thought,_ no windows, artificial lightsource. Secrecy._

He could sense no movement within the offices. The whole hallway felt lifeless and sterile.

Clicking sounds issued beside him, and Ichigo whipped his head around. Shinji leaned back on the blank wall, yellow ball of flames back in his hand. The blond furrowed his eyebrows in concentration and poked at it with his other hand. The flameball let out more clickings, and this time, whirling sounds. Ichigo felt the atmosphere around him shift, the slightest sensation of joint-stretching again. Shinji gave it a light squeeze and the sensation stopped, so did the sounds.

"What's that?" Ichigo asked. _The thing seemed familiar._

Shinji looked up to him, followed his gaze to the flames and then lifted his hand up so Ichigo could get a better look it. Ichigo now saw that there were clock hands on the surface beneath the flames. Shinji explained, "This is a multi-usage kido Hachi developed for the Vizards a while ago. One needs to wield both the Shinigami and Hollow reiatsu to use it. According to the directions given to it, it can do pretty nifty things. Right now, I used it to warp time and space. Which, I should probably tell you now, means..." he brought his hand back down and stared at it for a few seconds, "It has been only ten minutes since we left the training field. Also, we're in the sub-basement facility of the 12th division lab. This way, we gotta find the room." With that, he turned around and started walking.

Ichigo's eyebrows had gradually gone up as high as they would go, _"WHAT? _The hell you mean _sub-basement? _We climbed up that ladder for good half an hour to end up below ground?" _All the effort for basically nothing,_ he thought as he caught up to Shinji and fell into stride beside him. _Yup, he was going to make sure that Shinji ended up in that vat of cyanide later on._

"Hey, chill out, Ichigo! That was one of the only places the time and space-warp would work properly." Shinji then muttered, "I tell you that this thing can control time and space and you're pissed that your arms are sore."

Ichigo growled in preparation to yell some more, but recollection of an image struck him. _Second day back to Soul Society, after the whole ordeal with Kenpachi, Kladias conjuring a bright blue flames of pocketwatch in her hand-_

"Kladias had the same thing," Ichigo put the two images together, "I thought you guys didn't count her in as a Vizard?" _Damn, the whole thing was looking complicated._

Shinji grimaced, "Ugh. Can't believe we forgot to tell her not to use in public." with a sigh, he gave his fingers another twitch and the watch disappeared.

He continued, "Well no, we don't count Kladias in as a Vizard because _she is not a vizard_. Hachi's request to train her in kido basics before she joined Kensei's squad was approved, and we agreed that he slip a simplified version of it into the lessons. We told her that it's for telling time and direction, much like a compass. What we hadn't told her was that by using the kido on regular basis, it would cloak the hollow reiatsu in her and act as a locator. A tracking device."

"To keep on eye on her..." Ichigo added on, more to himself. _In case.. in case something like today happened?_

Neither of them picked up the conversation, shuffles of their feet and mechanical buzz of the lightbulbs the only sounds. Ichigo peeked into one office after another as he passed by them and found every single one of them unoccupied. _He wondered what such empty places were used for. For sure there weren't that many secret organizations in Seireitei...?_

Looking far ahead, now Ichigo could see a spot of white replacing what had been a dot of black - didn't seem like a person, more of a corner or a dead end coming up. A dozen more steps and he saw that it was a corner.

Atmosphere rippled again and Ichigo thought he heard voices far off. Fast-paced and quite loud, to be heard from this distance. _Argument?_ he wondered. Soon enough, he could hear clearly the words of shrill screeches that definitey belonged to... Hiyori?

"You had it under control? You had _**her **__UNDER CONTROL? _Which universe are'ya living in, _ya worthless limp-dick?"_

Scuffles of feet, rustles of fabric. A dull thud. Hiyori let out a sharp _"Ow!"_ followed by, "Wha- _didja just smack me ya-"_

"I keep telling you to _shut UP_, Hiyori!" It sounded like Kensei who was shouting now, "I _did_ have her under control. She threw bratty fits against orders every now and then but _so do you_. Generally speaking everything was completely fine-"

"Completely fine?_ Completely FINE? _Bitch punches a hole through a Kuchiki and you call that _completely __**FINE?**__"_

Ichigo turned around the corner just in time to see the petite blond woman launch herself at Kensei's near-6-feet stature. The latter caught the former by the her throat and chucked her away none too gently. Hiyori collided into the wall with a "Mmph!" and dropped down to the ground as if a ragdoll. But no ragdoll would then have glared up with such ferocity and showed her teeth in a snarl, poising to strike again-

_**"CUT THE FUCK OUT, BOTH OF YOU!"**_

Ichigo flinched, along with Hiyori and Kensei, at Shinji's outburst. All three of them stared wide-eyed at the blond captain a second before Hiyori let out a loud _"YOU!"_

She then sprang up as if electrocuted, shunpo-ed up to right in front of Shinji and stuck her face into his as close as her height let her, _"YOU're _the one who's a piece of _shit,_ _YOU!_ The fuck were'ya thinking, letting her fight? Past that phase of stupidity then at least ya could've kept an eye on her to put a stop whatever the fuck before-"

_Blur of white-_

_WHACK!_ Ichigo's eyes widened even more as Hiyori flew back head-first, Shinji's arm, palm open, where her head used to be.

"Things screwed up, _fine!" _Shinji roared, "But your going around hounding blames _isn't helping at all._ So just-" a second's pause, he pulled at a strand of his blond hair. Then in a deflated voice, "just shut up. Please shut up, Hiyori."

Ichigo never found out what Hiyori's response to Shinji's uncharacteristic display of sentiment as the air around them ripple again to materialize Rose, Love, Mashiro, Hachi and Lisa twenty feet away. He noticed that all of them were clad in shinigami attires and thought, _so all of them returned._

The group of five started forward and Mashiro sped forward, reflective goggles and neon-green hair glowing in the florescent lighting. She chirped, "Berry-tan! Bad news, we need to hurry-"

Then nothing. Her hazel eyes widened, mouth open to an 'O' shape.

Ichigo stared around, baffled, as he saw that everyone except for him had frozen in their spots, muscles rigid and eyes widened. His puzzlement grew to annoyance as simultaneous looks of dread draped down onto their faces. _Silent message he couldn't hear? Damn it._

"Something happening that I should know of?" Ichigo growled out, not bothering to hide his frustration.

Love, hardly looking serious with his star-shaped afro and sunglasses, let out a sharp "No." at the same time Shinji let out a "Yes." Ichigo caught the blond captain flickering a miffed look at Love before he hurried forward towards one of the doors.

Shinji spoke, "The Central 46's announced an emergency meeting, calling every captains and vice-captains in ASAP. The spokesperson didn't clarify what the 'trouble with one of the personnels' meant," Kensei stumbled aside as Shinji almost ran into him, "but we don't even have to second guess that it's Kladias who's in trouble- _Hachi, can you open this thing up quick?" _he hammered impatiently on the wooden door, which had just started glowing white, with his fist.

Hachi, still his enormous self, brought his equally-enormous hands together with a deafening slap. The wooden door Shinji had been banging on vanished entirely.

"He," Love jerked his chin towards at Ichigo and directed his gaze at Shinji, "can't come, Shinji. We've had the breakthrough we've all been waiting for and it's something we can't have him hear. Yet. Just believe me when I say it." Then at Ichigo, "Nothing personal, Ichigo, sorry."

That flared up Ichigo's irritation up to full and he hollered at Love, "Apology not accepted - _what do you mean by that I can't!"_ He clenched his fists but didn't feel the nails dig into the palms of his hands. The turn of events, sudden load of information and the possibility that Rukia could - _let's face it now, really -_ be DYING at this very moment jumbled his emotions up too far to feel physical pain. Then he growled out, calmer than he felt, with the most menacing voice he could manage,

"Do _NOT_ treat me like a child, Love, because I am _not._ If it has _anything at all _to do with me - which it obviously does, considering that it's _only_ me who you think shouldn't hear it - I have more than the full right to know."

Ichigo paused a second and resumed, "I have the power to fight, and you should know that. So don't. You. _Dare_ to leave me out of this." Then Ichigo turned his head to Shinji, expecting support.

What he had not been expecting was to see sincere, apologetic look in the blond's dark amber eyes, right before a quiet mutter of "Sorry."

Before Ichigo could react, snap of Hachi's fingers and the eight Vizards in front of him vanished in a unison of shunpo. The open doorway on the side sealed itself up in what looked like thick white plaster, a flash of white light telling him that it's again been reinforced with kido.

_"HEY!" _Ichigo yelped.

He leaped up and slammed his shoulder against the barrier, drove a punch into it when nothing gave. Only thing that was damaged appeared to be himself - _sure felt like it, _he thought as he felt his shoulder and hand throb.

_Bastard,_ Ichigo thought as he let out a frustrated yell,_ Shinji's definitely dug his own grave - three times in one day should be a confirmation enough._

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><p><strong>See ya all soon!<br>**


	18. The Execute

**A/N: Sorry in advance for such a short chapter - I got a tablet just last week and been busy spamming my dA gallery with Bleach fanarts instead of writing ;w ;**

**Anyhow, please do go on!**

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><p>Zangetsu, being a huge, heavy-ass zanpakuto it is, assaulted Ichigo's ears with a resonating clang as it bounced onto the wooden floor. It cluttered to a halt some ten feet away, reflecting the florescent light of the bulbs above. The harshness of the glint had an air of snarky leer about it, as if mocking its fuming wielder.<p>

Ichigo gnashed his teeth. He had just thrown the sword down in frustration; slashing away at the wall - _previously a door _- to the Vizard's meeting didn't even seem to have an effect. And as far as he could tell, the protective kido didn't even have a nick on it.

_"Damn it!" _he yelled out again, hands raised, wanting to tear his hair out. He opted for raking fingers through his locks instead.

_As if being excluded from the meeting was bad enough. _The idiots had left him with nowhere to go. He had a grasp of an idea that the kido-pocketwatch would offer a way out of the place, but it was stark obvious to him it wasn't a technique he could easily replicate from just looking at it a few times. There always was the option to Getsuga-Tensho his way either _into_ the meeting room or _out_ of here, but to his horror, he couldn't get the zanpakuto to unleash its signature attack. Not even a tiniest spurt of power. It was as if Zangetsu was giving him a silent treatment over... _what exactly?_

"Do _something,_ Zangetsu!" Ichigo snarled at the sword, wondering if he could provoke a reaction, "You miserable bastard - do a backflip! Jump up like you did at the field!"

_Nothing._

He had the urge to be ridiculous, "Twist yourself into a pretzel! Morph yourself into a freaking dandelion! _Anything!"_

_It was worse than dealing with a sulking 4-year-old. _At least with the kid, he could speculate what the problem was. Or just leave the entire mess to the parents and flee into the sunset.

Coming to a resignation that Zangetsu wasn't going to be communicative anytime soon, Ichigo groaned and sighed. Then he trotted up to the sword, heaved it off the ground and onto his back. _He'd deal with it later. _For now he had to find a way out. From what Shinji had told him, opinions of the Central 46 was still negatively biased when it came down to part-hollow shinigamis, and they could easily chuck Kladias back in the asylum _- Maggot's Nest, if he remembered correctly?_ He wanted to be there to stand up for her.

_..._

_Or did he?_

A part of him wasn't so sure. Would it be _right_ to stand up for her, after what she'd done? Would they declare her psychologically unstable, if it was impulse for blood that drove her to her actions?

_Was she a threat to Soul Society after all? Would it actually be better for her to be locked up, getting rid of the possibilities of her harming anyone else?_

_Then-_

Whispering sounds of shunpo from afar shook the questions off of Ichigo's mind. He snapped his head up, body tensing as he sensed the reiatsu approaching closer. The essence of the presence felt purely shinigami, not least a bit hollow. _Still, familiar. _But the reiatsu had been cloaked with some sort of a kido that prevented him from recognizing the specifics...

Ichigo flung his zanpakuto back out in front of him and positioned himself to a defensive stance as the owner of the reiatsu got closer at an alarming rate.

_Whoever the shinigami was, had excellent shunpo._

He poised himself onto the balls of his feet, ready to leap as soon as the presence was in sight-

A blur of black skidded around the corner - or rather, attempted to. The figure failed to slow down enough for a turn, momentum causing it to crash into the wall with an almighty _WHACK_ that shuddered the entire structure. Small pieces of plaster crackled down, puffs of dust clouds filled the air as the said black shape flung back from the wall. It landed onto the wooden floor with a heavy thud that couldn't have felt the least bit good.

Ichigo blinked, both from the dust and the vision-cloaking kido used to fuzz out the details of the shinigami, but he thought - _whoever the shinigami was, was sure to be in pain now._

As soon as the kido lifted, wielder's concentration obviously breached by the crash, the identity of the shinigami became clear-

"Hisagi-san - _What're you doing here?"_ Ichigo rushed forward to help the vice-captain to his feet.

Hisagi winced only slightly as he accepted the assistance, muttered out words of thanks as he attempted to shake off the white dust off of him as soaked puppy would shake off water.

"Are they in?" Hisagi asked, skipping over the previous question.

Ichigo supposed 'they' were the vizards, "Yeah, but they probably won't let you in-"

The vice-captain didn't wait to hear the end of the response; he strided to the place on the wall where the door used be and slammed a fist down, "Captain Mugurama, let me in! The Central 46 just-"

The wall vertically slitted open, a hand shot out - _Kensei's?_ - to grab Hisagi by the scruff of the shihakusho and forcefully jerked the vice-captain into the room. Before Ichigo could even twitch, the slit closed back up with a quiet _thump._

"What the HELL, guys?" Ichigo shouted, "A non-Vizard's allowed in, but _I'm_ not? What kind of screwed up logic is tha-"

He lost his words as the wall slitted back open, Hisagi's figure shot forward as if hurled out and crashed into the wall opposite once again. Before the slit closed itself back up, Ichigo caught sounds of a heated argument.

Hisagi stumbled away from the wall, reaching up to rub himself in the face with a groan that might have been a complaint.

"What happened? Just spit it out. _Now." _Ichigo demanded, too out of patience to bother to be polite.

Steel-gray irises bore into dark brown ones, and the latter pair narrowed as it struggle to determine the mix of carefully concealed emotions in the former.

Hisagi flatly spoke, "The Central 46 have already decided on a sentence for Kladias. Normal procedure in a situation like this would have been to wait full three days after sending out a summon to all of the high-ranking authorities around the city-"

"I don't give two shit about the procedure!" -_Ichigo really didn't-_ "What happened? Plain words!"

"Well, supported by an officer of undeniable influence and motivated by fear of unknown factors with Kladias, they seemed to have hurried themselves to a decision-"

Ichigo threw his hands up in the air, _"COME ON! _Skip the legal bullshit, what happened in the end? The decision?" _Screw it - Shinji's riddles were bad enough, but not this too!_

Hisagi scrunched his face up to a grimace, "Sorry, sorry Ichigo-san," he ran a hand through his pitch black spikes and huffed in a breath before he continued,

"Civilian - her title of Colonel and even Shinigami Officer has been revoked already - Kladias Kurozachs has been sentenced to capital punishment by the Central 46, by which circumstances of law, they haven't made clear. The decision has been announced as irreversible, which means exactly what it sounds like - it is final. As for the specific time the event will commence-"

"Hold on a sec!" Ichigo called out, "_Capital_ punishment? Wait, wait wait-"

_Last time he'd heard of that term used in Seireitei, it had been about Rukia. Which meant-_

"They're _executing_ Kladias?" Ichigo blurted out in horror.

_Tell me I'm wrong, Hisagi-san._

_Come on. Just say no._

_One word.  
><em>

A moments hesitation, and the vice-captain answered with a nod,

"Yes."

_..._

_One word, but not the one he was hoping for._

Ichigo didn't know what to think after that.

* * *

><p><strong>No, our hot-headed strawberry of a character's is NOT going to bolt out to beat the oppositions to pulps, nearly die few times, <strong>**acquire unbelievable power and put a stop to the execution by smashing whatever the equipments they were about to use seconds before the end.**

**Nope, I'd like to think what I have in store is completely different from the plot of that arc ;3**

**Also, could I get some feedback? I'm curious as to whether you're DYING for the next chapter each time, tearing your hair out in frustration at whatever I'm doing that ticks you off, just nodding along throughout the whole thing, or...?**

**Uh, that wasn't supposed to sound demanding -_-;  
><strong>


	19. The Distracted

**A/N: It's here - the next chapter! Be aware of timeskips, flashbacks...**

**Thanks to those of you who're reading! And those of you who reviewed, I luff you :3  
><strong>

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><p><em>Full moon blazed, white, white. All white.<em>

_With the night sky such flat, endless black, to him the pristine celestial figure was serenity and strangely enough, reassurance. Reassurance that everything else is a single bad dream. Such pure brightness surely wouldn't be co-existing with ugliness?_

_Off-white dunes of sand stretched out in front of him, darkening gradually as they blended into the horizon. Thin-branched, leafless gray trees stood at irregular intervals, jagged, crystalline lines glinting in the moonlight._

_Hueco Mundo - where desolation and dread clung to its very atmosphere in spite of the life he knew it was teeming with just below its surface, hiding mere inches below the misleading appearance._

_But he wasn't feeling desolate, wasn't feeling the dread - not this time. Moonlight soaked into the core of his bones, heading straight for his heart. He welcomed its presence, eager to be enveloped in the peace the action brought._

_His soul brimmed with energy - raw, barely restrained power that made him feel invincible._

_But more importantly, he wasn't alone._

_The calmness and the power vanished as soon as the presence abruptly pulled itself out of him. His knees buckled and he cried out, reached up at the lone gleaming disk in the expanse of darkness, questioning why he was let go all too soon. Too soon. He already craved the sense of capability, camaraderie even more so. His chest felt tight, every breath a struggle._

_As if pitying his desperation, presence flashed within him again, his essence of power re-lit. But it scattered out of him as soon as it came._

_Teeth clenched, he stared forlornly at the circle of light, pondering if such pure being as it was gaining pleasure out of his pain. His wretched look switched to one of disbelief as several droplets of crimson splattered across it, marring its perfection._

_The semi-thick dots of liquid began to trail downwards._

_Before he could comprehend the significance of the happening, ground quaked. He strained to stay upright as his vision blurred and the blacks and whites of the scene distorted._

_When the landscape had stilled itself and his vision cleared, he shuddered at the unnaturalness of his surroundings. Inverted world. Sand dunes of deep black, nearly indistinguishable outline of branches upon it. Pale, colorless white sky glaring at him._

_Full white moon no longer blazed. Not full, not full. No white, no white._

_In its place was an inky black waning crescent that offered none of the serenity and reassurance its color-invert counterpart did. It exuded power fit to be handled only by _the _devil, something he had no desire to grasp control of. Its aura was excruciatingly bleak, heartbreakingly sinister._

_He desired for a way out, willing not to be crushed by the reiatsu. He glanced about and found none._

_As if to stroke him to submission, a surprisingly soft breeze caressed his cheek, playfully rippling his hair and shihakusho. A disembodied, teasing, vaguely familiar voice whispered-_

_"Shh."_

_The breeze stopped, whisper faded. The particles of air itself abandoned motion. But the black crescent moon still radiated its foreboding power. Leering down at him._

_He still desired for a way out, becoming fidgety as a chill trickled down his spine._

_Soft laughter echoed all around._

_Powerful pressure ripped through the air, exploding up from ground up. He scrunched his eyes shut and raised his arms up to shield himself from the whirlwind of sand that sure was to come after - except it never came. Slitting his eyes open, he could see that the black sand dunes remained unaffected by the outburst of energy._

_White sky slashed open as if knifed, black moon injured at the center of the strike._

_He howled in agony and collapsed as pain ripped across his torso, hip to shoulder. Wetness splattered onto his hands._

_He rolled onto his back and through his now tear-filled eyes, witnessed another slash crossing the previous one._

_Waves of pain pulsated through his entire being. Again. And again._

_His eyes had blacked out from the torture long ago, but merciless torment of the invisible blades refused to cease._

_No... He couldn't die now, he couldn't die when-_

Ichigo jolted up with both hands clutching his throat, entire body impossibly taut from a silent scream he was choking back.

* * *

><p>Unbelievably, the bloody nightmare hadn't been the worst part of his morning.<p>

As he got ready to head to his office, he found that he had misplaced his substitute shinigami badge. He was incredulous as to _how_ he lost it, since he made it top-priority have it with him at all times after he came to Seireitei. If he remembered correctly, it had been lying on top of his bedroom's dresser, at an arm's length of the bed in case of emergencies.

_No idea HOW it would be able to help him in case someone chose to treat him like a pincushion for swords, but that aside..._ the little slab of wood felt as much a part of him as his own zanpakuto.

_Speaking of Zangetsu, that spirit might as well have DIED in there, for all he knew._ He still had no idea what he had done wrong to deserve such a childish silent treatment.

He plopped himself down on the living room couch and dedicated a few moments to glare at the said unresponsive piece of metal on his lap before he had to bolt. Then his eyes fell on the badge he was looking for - bathed in pastel orange light of sunrise, on the corner the coffee table. Tiny black eyes of the skull innocently bore into him.

Feeling like a failure for not having spotted it earlier, Ichigo snatched it up, heaved himself and his sword off the couch and proceeded out of the house.

* * *

><p>"-which translates to a conclusion that Captain Soi Fon of the 2nd division is in full support for the capital punishment, Vice-Captain Omaeda alike. Captain Otoribashi of the 3rd division had been absent from the conference, though from his vice-captain's statement and Central 46's deduction from his previous standings in matters, it is widely speculated he would be avidly opposed of the punishment. However, as for Captain Unohana of the fourth division- "<p>

Ichigo found himself tuning out the spoken report the Nakade shinigami in the middle of giving. _Again._

He was currently seated behind the large desk in the middle Kladias's office, ironically being reported on the office's owner's state of legal _- life and death - _matters.

It wasn't that the information wasn't critical, nor the said officer was responsible for boring him; in fact, Ichigo had been impressed with the shinigami's ability to articulate the tone of his voice on the very brink of colorless professionalism and excitement, voice that would be more than capable of capturing attention of large groups of shinigamis for any given length of time.

It was just that Ichigo couldn't get himself to stop replaying the series of yesterday's events in his head. He had half the mind to shoo away his subordinate, bury his head in his hands and pour all his brainpower to try to see reason behind every single factor that was going wrong in his world.

_Or both of his worlds, since it's take him more than few day's neglect to give up on Zangetsu - _but he was afraid that another attempt to meditate into communication would fast-forward his time again. First time it had happened, it had been two hours, second time, five. According to all damn maths he had learned in school, no valid pattern could be extracted from first two numbers of the sequence, but his gut - _which had saved LIVES in multiple occasions, which he trusted far more than cold-fact calculations -_ told him that every attempt would sap away more time than one before it did.

"-and thereby concludes the evidence that Captain Komamura of the 7th Division is in full support of the capital punishment. On the other hand, Captain Kyouraku of the 8th Division- "

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><p><em>First course of action Ichigo took was to shove Hisagi into a wall by the front of shihakusho, pinning the startled vice-captain down with his full body weight-<em>

_"The HELL you mean by 'yes?' They can't do that! Unless, unless Rukia's-" he stuttered,_

_"unless she's-"_

_His next breath came out as nothing, strange buzz filling the inside of his ears as implication of the capital punishment began to dawn onto him-_

_**Rukia... died?**  
><em>

_Pair of wide gray eyes in front of him narrowed slightly in puzzlement, followed by re-widening in realization, shock and other flickers of emotions Ichigo couldn't get himself to care at that moment-_

_Hisagi cried, "For heaven's sake - NO, Kurosaki. She's not dead- Kuchiki-san is __**NOT DEAD**__, Kurosaki-san! __**She's**__** alive! **__Now calm down! Please calm down, we can't have you going into a fit of rage now."_

_Ichigo blinked. He felt his shoulders slump a little, a strange tingle in his hands - blood had begun to flow back into them - as he unwittingly relaxed. As meaning of Hisagi's words fully sank in, the loud buzz in his ears fell back to a quieter, mechanical buzz of the light fixtures above._

_Hisagi gently nudged him back, a base of palm on shoulder, and Ichigo complied, stumbling for a fraction of a second before he righted himself. His fingers felt stiff and awkward as he let go of the fellow officer's shihakusho._

_Feeling the vice-captain's cautious gaze on him, Ichigo willed himself not to fidget, willing not to show how embarrassed he was of the instability displayed just seconds ago. He bore back into the clear, steely orbs with what he was hoping was unshakable determination he knew he was so well known for._

_Relief flooded into Ichigo as Hisagi gave a minuscule nod of what positively was an approval - relief turned to bewilderment as another look crossed over the vice-captain's face- sorrow, disappointment?_

_**At what?**_

_Before Ichigo could fully figure out, Hisagi swiveled around on one heel, gestured for Ichigo to follow as he jogged back over to the corner he initially came from. He spoke,_

_"The conference hasn't ended yet - if we hurry, we might be able to slip in to hear last part."_

_Definitely intrigued, Ichigo caught up swiftly as Hisagi launched into a series of consecutive, evenly spaced shunpos. Colors of the surroundings at first distorted, then blended into one another as the two of them sped through the deserted hallway._

* * *

><p>"Lieutenant-Colonel- <em>Lieutenent-Colonal Kurosaki?"<em>

"Huh?"

Caught off-guard, Ichigo jerked up - _when did he start slouching?_ He found himself staring into the Nakade shinigami's face of almost-successfully-concealed disapproval.

_Damn. He wouldn't like it either if his superior zoned out on him._

The shinigami blankly stared back and held up an inch-thick bundle of folders and spoke evenly,

"Sir, may I suggest that I leave the written records for you to read instead?"

Ichigo silently fumed, feeling for certain that he'd let an incapable part of him shine through by failing to concentrate on the spoken report. To keep his shorter-now-than-ever temper from boiling over, he had to remind himself that it was _not_ Nakade shinigami's fault. He gestured at coffee table in front of the sofa and replied,

"Yeah, just leave it along with-" he deflated as his eyes fell to a messy, foot-high stack of paperwork already there, "-the rest." then he hastily added, instead of an apology, "Thanks, Officer Azutora."

The shinigami seemed to stiffen slightly before loosening back up. Though unsmiling, he gave a nod, "At your service, Lieutenant-Colonel Kurosaki."

He dropped off the said paperwork to top of the pile and left, sliding shut the door behind him.

Ichigo was left free to let his head fall to the desk with a _thud._

* * *

><p><strong>I'd appreciate it if I kept getting the feedbacks - I definitely get motivated to write more if there's evidence that people ARE reading the fanfic.<br>**

**It took me 19 chapters, 45k words to finally bring myself in terms with that. Go screw yourself now, denial, that I'm fine all on my own.  
><strong>

**/end providing you with unnecessary, self-deprecating mumbles  
><strong>


	20. Flickering Lights & Thoughts

**A/N: I'm sorry for spazzing out on you guys last week.**

**For what it's worth, I felt embarrassed five minutes after, considered taking it down but decided not to in the end... Thanks to you who have stuck with the story in spite of the author(me)'s spazziness.**

***provides a new chapter as a distraction from all the awkwardness*  
><strong>

* * *

><p>Three knocks issued from the door, followed by an unfamiliar female voice,<p>

"Lieutenant-Colonel Kurosaki?"

With a soft grunt, Ichigo straightened himself up from a thick leather-bound tome he had been slouched over. His shoulders popped and crackled in complaint as he shrugged and rotated them. He had been in the same position, poring over documents of all sorts, for hours now, attempting a research that was turning out to be fruitless. Arms thudding onto either sides of the book, he said in the best professional tone he could muster,

"Come in."

The door in front of him slid open to reveal a blank-faced, rather unremarkable female shinigami with sleek, chin-length black hair,

"Kuchiki-sama is waiting for you."

Ichigo flinched and shot up from his chair, rattling the whole desk to send documents flying in all directions, upsetting an ink bottle(unopened, luckily) as the professional facade was completely thrown off,

"She's _awake? _Since when? Holy shi-"

_"Captain_ _Kuchiki_, dimwit. You _do_ know there's another one?" a familiar voice interrupted.

Ichigo felt his heart deflate, but outwardly he bristled, "How was I supposed to know? Get lost if you're here just to call me names, freaking pineapple-head."

The female shinigami hurriedly stepped aside and tilted down to a slight bow as Renji stomped into view. His head of vivid red hair was in his usual ponytail, except it was looking more frazzled and unkempt than ever.

Upon further inspection, Ichigo noticed that the entire _person_ was at the similar disheveled state, if not worse.

He felt a twinge of concern, however brash the redhead was acting at the moment. He jerked a thumb towards one of the office's unoccupied sofa,

"Or shut up and crash - a tickle and you look about ready to sleepwalk and commit a mass-murder."

Renji's lips twitched to what could've been a smile fraction of second before he scoffed and spat out at the female shinigami, "Dismissed, officer. Head back to the manor to notify Captain Kuchiki that we'll be there as soon as possible."

The woman shunpo-ed off after a quick "Yes, sir!"

"Yo - speak for yourself!" Ichigo scowled, "Since when Byakuya's free to summon me up whenever he feels like it? He can't be that stupid to expect me to hop to his side at a second's notice."

Renji's bandana shifted as he raised an eyebrow, "Second's notice _my ass_, he sent you a note at around 9, which is-" he ducked in to glance up at the clock on the wall right beside the door, "-five hours ago."

Ichigo warily redirected his eyes from the clock to the haphazard piles of paperwork on the coffee table and a smaller version of it on the desk in front of him - throughout the course of his morning, he had called for so many different documents and books for that he lost track of other paperworks.

The vice-captain, having looked around on his own, yelped. "The hell have you been up to, Ichigo? Never thought of you as the type to drown boredom in books and papers, much less-" he quickly walked up to the desk and flipped the thick, leather-bound book shut, much to Ichigo's distaste seeing as he lost the page number...

Renji's read the title out loud, "_History of Seireitei: Crime, Law and Punishment?" _he lifted his head up to bore Ichigo with a disbelieving stare, "Correction - who the hell _are_ you?"

"Shut up!" Ichigo fumed, telling himself that he had NOT been caught doing something wrong, "Let's get going before the _other Kuchiki _explodes in impatience." He hurried around the desk, grabbing a handful from the shoulder of Renji's shihakusho and forcefully tugging him back.

The redhead sputtered through his sudden loss of balance, "Hold on a sec - gotta undo your seal, Ichigo."

Ichigo grimaced and looked down to his hand at the end of his outstretched arm, to the small black rectangle right above his wrist at the base of his hand's tattoos.

* * *

><p><em>He had gotten to the conference - who knew one can take the stairs out of the supposed super-secret time-warped underground facility? - just in time to hear himself get sentenced to a house arrest.<em>

_Under no circumstance would he have obeyed without putting up a fight - he did, quite vocally, and to his surprise, there were others backing him up. But the Central 46 had made it clear over and over again the only other option they were willing to offer was time in jail, decorated with mind-blowing amount of complicated legal terms he had no intention of asking for the definitions._

_Half an hour later he settled for the original sentence(confined to training division's grounds), for the moment more interested in getting their yapping faces off his back than anything else. To his horror, he had been escorted to the 12th Division for 'standard' testing procedures that required him to sit alone in a bare room for three hours - hours he spent grinding his teeth blunt. After that, back to the training grounds, right hand stamped with a kido-seal that would notify the entire of Seireitei's armed forces and the Commander General himself the moment he stepped over the boundary._

_Himself from one and a half years ago might have bolted out at any given moment, zanpakuto brandishing with no plans for the future - other than battling off whoever - as to where to go or even what to do after._

_The current him might have done exactly that too even if he had known, even with an extremely disoriented state of mind he was in, that plunging into such trouble head-first was one of the stupidest thing he could do._

_It didn't help his Zangetsu wasn't done moping._

_Anyhow, he had other thoughts._

* * *

><p>As Renji led him to the Kuchiki manor, Ichigo rubbed the spot where the black kido-seal used to be - the vice-captain had taken it off by applying a small square sheet of translucent paper to the mark, followed by muttering out a rather long incantation. Then the square burst to flames, immediately followed by a small explosion.<p>

_Ichigo hadn't been sure if the explosion had been absolutely necessary, considering Renji's kido skills..._

Now the reddened skin felt and looked tender and weak, as if it had been scrubbed with sandpaper.

"So you have finally come, Kurosaki Ichigo."

Still figure of Kuchiki Byakuya stood at the front entrance of the manor's garden, ever-present aura of authority hanging about him.

Renji came to a halt in front of his captain, "My apologies, captain, the message got lost in delivery."

Brief eye contact and small nod at the captain, Ichigo gave a nonchalant "Yo, Byakuya." then strutted past the two, through the entrance and into the garden.

"Where do you think you are going?" Byakuya, ever so slightly demanding, spoke,

"Ehh?" Ichigo came to a stop, turned himself around to face the speaker, "Renji said your manor, so... there?" he raised an eyebrow to stare at the Kuchiki with an isn't-it-obvious look.

"No, Kurosaki Ichigo," almost unnoticeably, the captain's jaw tightened, "I have been asked to escort you to the 4th Division."

Renji perked up and sputtered, "Wha- but Captain, he-"

Byakuya silenced the redhead with a stern look.

Ichigo's eyes darted between the two of them, "What now?" he threw his hands up in the air,

"If they think I'm gonna go through some medical testing procedure for them, _they're wrong! _You know what - I'm going back-"

"You are mistaken, Kurosaki Ichigo," Byakuya cut him off, eyeing him somewhat disapprovingly before speaking again,

"I am taking you to see Rukia."

* * *

><p>"It is not as bad as you seem to think it is, Kurosaki-san."<p>

_Ichigo knew Unohana-san was the best in Seireitei's medicinal field, but she might as well have told him that in a minute, Rukia was going to sprout wings, take flight and dance a can-can, all the while sprinkling sparkly fairy dust._

He was standing at the doorstep of a classroom-sized, windowless and bare white room. So even though sunlight was blazing to its full outside, not a single ray of warmth filtered in - entire of the ceiling was lit up with clean, cold artificial florescent light that screaming HOSPITAL. It also reminded Ichigo of the 12th Division's underground facility he had been to yesterday, but more to his unease, a morgue.

Rukia lied suspended three feet above ground at dead-center of the room, unmoving and skin frighteningly pale, almost blending into her pristine white kimono. By contrast, her head of black hair looked darker than ever and strangely, it was also slightly longer than it had been yesterday. Whether it was by twisted humor of true fate or paranoia, Ichigo thought she looked the exact same as she did at her execution.

_Except she had been awake._

A transparent coffin-like box of faint glowing white light enveloped her tiny figure, kido-strings of various thickness and color encased the box in a loose cocoon. The colored light of the strings pulsed to brightness at different intervals, giving Ichigo a sense of being a spectator at an exotic light show.

He had only caught a gist of Unohana-san's explanation; Rukia had practically been brought back from the dead only to be plunged into a self-induced coma. No one knew the exact state her shinigami reiatsu was in, nor when she would wake up. A voice at the back of his mind prodded him to ask about the relapse he witnessed at the field, but more prominent part of him couldn't seem to think past staring wide-eyed at the whirls of colors, much less form words.

"If it would be of any comfort to you, Kurosaki-san, she is under excellent care. Vice-Captain Kotetsu and I had finished tending to her only late last night, remaining kidos have been carefully designed to best fit her. All we can do now is to wait with patience."

Ichigo stood frozen still, barely felt it as the motherly captain laid a gentle hand on his shoulder. Rapid beats of his heart thudded in sync with the pulse of the lights...

"I..." He felt like he should say something, even few words, to prove to her that he was going to be fine.

Instead he tore his eyes away from Rukia, brushed the hand on his shoulder off and spun away from the doorway,

"I'd better get going." He took a few steps forward before remembering - he spared a glance over his shoulder, to the still-standing Captain's soft, apologetic eyes,

"Thank you, Unohana-san."

* * *

><p>By the time Ichigo sprinted back to the large koi pond of the 4th Division's garden where his two companions waved him off, he saw that only Byakuya remained. Sensing his return, the captain slowly turned to face him.<p>

"Where'd Renji go?"

Ichigo firmly rooted a topic, though he doubted the ever-composed captain was about to ask his well-being after the visit. _Frankly, he wasn't sure if image of Rukia like that, an usually vibrant, vying spirit muted to motionless helplessness, would ever completely fade from his mind..._

Byakuya replied, "I have relieved Vice-Captain Abarai of his duties for the time being. He had been working tirelessly since evening yesterday."

"Figures. But isn't it a little too nice of you to give him a break, just like that?"

Ichigo got only a silent, slate-gray glare out of that remark.

The look in Byakuya's eyes toned down to its usual blankness, same careful, controlled tone in his voice as he spoke, "I have been meaning to ask, Kurosaki Ichigo."

During a grandiose pause that followed, Ichigo stared wryly at the asker.

"Did you, by any means, take part in the crime committed yesterday afternoon?"

"No." Ichigo spat out without a second's delay.

_Byakuya had heard his testimony at yesterday's conference... Why ask again? It was starting to get on his nerves._

"Would you swear it on your own very life - or rather, lives of your family? Your dear father, your beloved sisters?"

Ichigo frowned and opened his mouth to do so, but -

...

_"Shinji! You know something we don't?"_

_The blond captain's head whipped back to reveal surprised eyes of black sclera, grey irises - hollowification mid-progress._

_A sickening crunch rang out._

_...  
><em>

_Had Shinji been about to interfere, to put a stop to the fight?_

_Had his shout distracted him from doing so?_

_Then..._

_If he hadn't called out, could the disaster have been avoided?_

"Answer, Kurosaki Ichigo," Byakuya's stern voice reminded him back to the present.

Ichigo ground his teeth, suddenly unsure of his position in the matter. _Even if unintentionally, one could say he had provided one of the factors for the catastrophe to commence..._

He stared back into the cold, slate-gray eyes, struggling to decide on an answer when a presence punched into his mind-

_**Walls, walls. Aaand two more walls. Two plus two equals four. Four to the power of eight equals sixty-five thousand seven-hundred - no wait five-hundred - fuck that. Roses are blue, violets are red. Tiny blue sky on the wall's taunting me.**_

Vision blurring, Ichigo blanched and put a hand to his forehead - _that hadn't been his own thoughts._

_**Why the fuck did the walls have to be all white?**_

_**And clean? Don't people usually get bored and scratch failure of soul-awakening poems onto the walls? Or draw crap? Actually, that's a fun idea - bah, there's nothing to write with. And hell if I'm even gonna try writing with my own blood.**_

_**They could at least've put a lower ceiling to this god damned place. Whole ratio's screwed up.**_

Through his distorted vision, Ichigo saw Byakuya's lips moving but nothing came to his ears-

_**Just lying here's tiring. I can't be getting old already - maybe the walls are sapping my energy out? Yeah, that makes sense - what'd the old geezers back at the courses say? Something about special stone blocking the fuck out of reiatsu... And then some other nonsense, like no matter what it's not gonna break. Nothing helpful. Maybe I shouldn't've slept through those lectures. But monotone blabs over half a minute's highway to dreamland, period.**_

Ichigo's head ached - he scrunched his eyes shut and gave a harsh rub to his forehead - _what the hell? _He heard Byakuya's voice now, perhaps something similar to concern in the tone, barely audible-

_**HOW the hell did I get here? WHY did I get locked up in this place - fine, full-out screaming match with the asshole wasn't the smartest thing I could've done. But a lock-up? Really? What century's right now, even? Why isn't anyone coming along - would it set fire to a basket of newborn puppies to let me know? Or FEED me - I'm starving.**_

_**This sucks.**_

_**What's this weird place built for, anyway? I can't think of any-**_

With great effort, almost physically painful concentration, Ichigo managed to rip the uninvited consciousness out of him. He reopened his eyes and was relieved when the world spun back to focus, surface of the koi pond glittering in the blinding sunlight. A large leaf fluttered by momentarily blocking out a small part of the reflected light from his eyes.

"Kurosaki Ichigo?"

He shifted his focus to the speaker - Byakuya looked as alarmed as his cold demeanor would allow him to, hands raised halfway up as if unsure of what to do.

Ichigo didn't believe even for a second he could pass whatever expression he had on his face and head-clutching off as nothing.

_The 6th division's captain wasn't a moron._

But he had to try,

"Damn it, Byakuya, would it _kill_ you to not call me by full name for once?"

He caught disbelief turning to annoyance cross the captain's face before the presence jabbed back into his mind, this time with a flash of pain-

_**HO-LYfuckin'motherof-**_

_**AHHH!**_

_**Is - DAMMIT - my hand - FUCK! - broken?**_

_**Shit, shit shit shit shitshitshitshit- ow.**_

_**Nnngh. Wasn't that just freakishly useless.**_

Ichigo shoved it away again - with less difficulty than last time, thankfully. Throbbing in his right hand ebbed until it was only a ghostly pulse.

_He was pretty sure that hadn't been Zangetsu nor Tensa Zangetsu - as omniscient, cryptic and more recently, paraoid the spirit's been, he had never been whiny. Or maybe his hollow self decided to butt in and adopt a new persona - nope, it wasn't him either._

Reaching a dead-end with the thought, Ichigo decided to turn his attention back to more immediate concern in his current world-

"Bye, Byakuya!"

Ichigo fled, shunpo-ing over the wall of the garden and into the deserted streets.

_Need time to think. Alone._

* * *

><p><strong>Holy crap - 20 chapters? Over 50k words now...!<br>**

**Weird chapter is weird, I know ;w ;  
><strong>


	21. Countdown Towards the Blizzard's Calm

**A/N: Eeep, been almost two weeks already? Sorry about that, writing didn't easily come to me past several days ;w ;  
><strong>

**Anyhow, on goes the story...**

* * *

><p>After unceremoniously ditching Byakuya with what admittedly was a laughable, childish farewell, Ichigo plunged himself into the empty streets. His peripheral vision blurred as he gained momentum, run quickly transitioning to shunpo. He was eager to put as much distance as he could between him and the 6th division's captain or rather, the question he left unanswered...<p>

Only after few minutes of the speedy runaway he remembered hearing that the said shinigami was considered to be one of Seireitei's top class shunpo masters, speed ranked second to so-called God of Flash Shihouin Yoruichi herself.

He skidded to a halt at the next corner he encountered, soles of his feet screeching against the gritty stone tiles. Feeling dizzy from the sudden deceleration, he put a hand on the wall to steady himself.

There were no hints of pursuit: no sounds of footsteps, no buzz of shunpo in the air. As far as his never-to-be-fully-trusted reiatsu detection skills told him, there were no significant presence of shinigami nearby.

_If Byakuya had wanted to catch up to him, he surely would've by now._

Ichigo glanced around one last time before pivoting around to land back-first onto the off-white wall with a soft _thump._ His stomach gave a funny jolt as his shoulder blades struck the hard surface - _he had forgotten Zangetsu, left it propped up against the desk back at the office._

He half expected separation anxiety to cripple his coherent thoughts like it had on the first day back, but no such reaction came. Only a mild, colorless _'oh' _in the midst of his mind.

_He wondered whether he had gone crazy, feeling not the least off-beat at not having his ultimate weapon, part of his soul at his side._

_Or maybe he wasn't going crazy - maybe he was finally weaning from the unreasonable sense of protection the sword offered him...?_

Ichigo snorted - _since when he was completely vulnerable without Zangetsu in his hand? Not to mention the thing was nothing of use in combat with Kira yesterday..._

His thought switched gears as he folded his arms in front of him. He stared unseeingly at the chipped floor tiles beneath his feet-

_As for that rambling thought in his mind..._

* * *

><p><em>He had been in Kladias's head.<em>

Faint nausea crept up on him and Ichigo leaned forward as he told himself again,

_He had been in her head, her thoughts relayed to him as easily as if she had spoken them to him loud and clear._

He had come to that conclusion only few minutes after he had started clawing at what little there was to his shinigami knowledge. It was the only plausible one of frustratingly few possibilities his mind drew up.

A while back in the human world, before he had gone on the rescue mission to Hueco Mundo, one too many cups of coffee, one too many _boxes _of Twinkies and worst of all, mistaking a can of light beer for coke had led Rukia to one brilliant case of insomnia. By daybreak, she had sunk to a hazy, semi-stupor state, babbling on about nothing and everything from her self-designated space inside his closet - _she didn't like the comfortable, cushiony bed provided for her by his idiot father and soft-hearted sister_ - while he continued on his futile attempt to silently curse himself to sleep, head buried beneath two pillows and the heaviest medical encyclopedia he could find in the house.

Blame the sleep deprivation or general annoyance, but he had either forgotten or blocked out majority of the Rukia's babbles. But some of the things had been tattooed into his mind, recount of her days before her execution one of them. Her voice had plunged down to near inaudible whispers of secrets while she stuttered to get her words out about how her awaiting executioner, Soukyokou, had been visible through her white prison's window, how unfair it was that tiny birds were free to flutter in and out that window while she could not, sekkiseki stone walls draining the life's force out of her...

Then her voice skipped up two octaves as she switched onto trying to recite kido incantations back to front, bursting into fits of giggles every time she made a mistake. After another flat-voiced "shut up" Ichigo tuned her out, but-

_White prison. Sekkiseki stone walls draining the life's force out of her._

The consciousness in his mind had speculated the white walls affecting her energy level - _her _since he had a gut feeling that it wasn't a man. As far as he could figure, Kladias had been the only one to be sentenced to capital punishment since Rukia had been with hers. And there was only one white tower reserved for imprisoning criminals as such...

_Tall, white tower._

It also had complained about the room having a screwed-up ratio, ceiling too high for its floor space.

Ichigo put a hand to his forehead, pushed with his palm until his head struck back to the wall.

_If it indeed was Kladias's thoughts that flooded into his mind, HOW was that possible- no, WHY was that possible?_

_What was the connection?_

_Hold on a sec- no connection, but maybe a binding kido. That'll be it, one used to deliver messages directly to peoples' mind-_

_But Kladias was a failure of a kido manipulator, last time he checked-_

Ichigo yelped and swung out an arm as something small and black fluttered into his face, smashing whatever it was onto the wall beside him.

Shinji's voice, uncharacteristically low and quick but still with its underlying lilting tone, sprung from underneath his arm-

_"Oy, Ichigo,"_

Ichigo gave another yelp and jumped back from the black blotch. Only then he noticed it was a hell butterfly.

_"chances are Kuchiki didn't tell you - you would've set out to cut his head off and he probably knew that. I'll-"_

Shinji abruptly stopped speaking as another voice yelled something in the background-

_"Shut up Lisa, I'm on it, I AM sending him one RIGHT NOW there's no point in darting off to drag his ass here thank you very much for your concern now get the hell going - okay, Ichigo, I'll get straight to the point, heavens forbid you get impatient and shred the poor insect to pieces like Kladias-chan did with her very first one-"_

Ichigo quirked up on eyebrow as Hiyori's_ "GET UP HERE, DICKHEAD!"_ echoed in the distance. Then Kensei rumbling mumble followed by Mashiro's high-pitched squeaks. Shinji let out a cross between a sigh and a whine before continuing,

_"anyway, you'd better come to Soukyokou hill right now, Ichigo, and when I say right now I mean right fucking __NOW. __The TRUE dickheads of Seireitei - by that I mean the Central 46 - just announced to all of the captains that Kladias's execution's been moved up to fifteen minutes from now, and yeah, NOW. They're out of their minds, playing it cheap, most likely hoping for as small of an audience as possible. And they're bringing back an ancient custom-"_

By then Ichigo had abandoned his spot by the hell butterfly, already streaking towards the ever-looming cliff ahead.

* * *

><p>While Ichigo streaked his way from rooftops to rooftops; he had no intention nor hopes of successfully navigating through the streets in time, who was he kidding?He contemplated tapping into what he decided was Kladias's thoughts, mix of worry and curiosity struggling with respect for privacy.<p>

He settled on meeting the two halfway.

Keeping an eye on his speeding-past surroundings - _slip of a toe and he would freefall to a bloody splat -_ he gingerly peeled off the mind's barrier he set up earlier against Kladias's consciousness, not enough for it to overwhelm him like it did last time but only for the tiniest portion, general ambiance of it to seep through...

_Whoa?-_

It was a challenge for him not to falter his steps, to keep his speed up-

_He hadn't been expecting that._

_He might as well have been slapped in the face with a desaturated rainbow._

_Massive whirls of emotions, a catastrophic, dark blizzard of swirling feelings screaming at him. Not all of which he could pinpoint names for. Not a droplet of positivity flaring in the mix-_

As if sensing the one tiny opening he gave to the barrier, the almost liquid wave of consciousness on the other side brimmed up and threatened to burst open, to flood his mind and take him over again. Breath hitching and throat stiffening, fighting back the blackness creeping from the sides of his vision, Ichigo frantically snapped shut the opening. His mind's barrier wavered as the force from the other side fought to knock it down.

He swore out loud as he trod on a pebble, the tiny stone breaking the balance and rhythm he had going with his shunpo. He managed to catch himself before he smashed head-first onto the roof.

Forcing himself not to panic, Ichigo strained his eyes and stared ahead, concentrating on putting one foot ahead of the other, one shunpo after another, putting his hitched breath back to normal rhythm...

Eventually, all out-of-place movements ebbed back down, both inwards and out. He sliced through the air, wind flattening his hair onto the top of his scalp, each footholds steady and firm against the dark, sun-battered roof tiles.

_No more pebble-attacks._

His mind's barrier held, the consciousness on the other side safely silenced for the moment.

He hadn't gotten much out of the terrifying venture into Kladias's mind.

_But say, if he translated the blizzard literally... Would it be confusion?_

Ichigo dismissed the idea with a disbelieving shake of his head - _faced with a sudden execution; panic would be more likely..._

_Or - what the hell._

He gave up trying to figure anything out, since in no way he was a freaking certified psychologist.

At reaching base of the stairs, the site of his second and last battle with Renji, he started his streak up the stairs without even faltering to catch his breath.

* * *

><p>Ichigo stumbled onto top of the Soukyokou hill, grumbling quietly as he plucked tiny twigs off his hair and shihakusho. By no means getting through the forest of brambles had been an impossible challenge, but plenty of the nature's unwelcomed presents snagged onto him enough to tickle his already boiling temper.<p>

He turned his head forward again to face towards the far end of the cliff. He didn't expect to see the Soukyokou Duo - he recalled that the pair of ancient artifacts had been shattered to uselessness on the day of Rukia's execution: enormous phoenix dissipated in the air, part of the wooden beams that survived the destruction dug up and removed from the ground afterwards.

But neither had he expected to see a fifty-feet tall off-white wall towering above him some hundred feet away, level surface stretching across the full width of the cliff's surface, cutting him off from where he supposed the scene of Kladias's execution was.

Dread jerked through him as he started sprinting towards the wall.

_Was he too late?_

But the consciousness in his mind was still there, raging against his mind's barrier as rabidly as ever.

_Then Kladias was still alive..._

He had covered half the distance when a blur of black and white dropped down from above to neatly land in front of him-

Shinji straightened up and shot Ichigo a silent, venomous glare.

Ichigo scowled, "Am I late or wha-"

"Cutting it close, aren't ya?" the blond captain snarled, "Just over a minute to spare, hurry the fuck up-"

"Cut the crap - no need to boss me around." Ichigo snarled back - _what the hell was with Shinji?_

Shaking thoughts clear, Ichigo took a deep breath and focused all his energy onto the sole of one foot, briefly pressing all his weight onto it before leaping into the air.

* * *

><p><strong>I know that wasn't canon - I had too much fun writing up caffeinatedTwinkied/semi-drunk Rukia. I can totally imagine that happening xD**

** So I'm leaving in there, let's say she stayed a night before Grimmjow and his Fraccion brewed up trouble :D**

**Two sketches up on my deviantART, go check them out from my profile if you'd like - one initial sketch of Kladias, another one sort of PotBM preview/promotion poster with few scene snapshots thingamajigs of such. On the second one, I think I managed to draw her almost exactly as how I pictured her in my mind... x)  
><strong>

**See you later - next chapter'll contain more action, literally. In case anyone's wondering.  
><strong>


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